1
RECONSTRUCTION
Americans had faced no greater challenge than that of "reconstructing" the defeated
South. Above and beyond the dilemma of politically reintegrating the states that had
rebelled was the far more problematic task of dealing with the millions of African
Americans who has been held in slavery by southerners. Should they be granted the
full rights of political and economic citizenship? If so, how should this largely illiterate
and impoverished mass be prepared for their responsibilities?
Addressing these issues launched one of the most remarkable -- and bitterly
contested -- social experiments in the history of the nation: an unprecedented
partnership between private initiative and the federal government that would
profoundly shape the development of philanthropic institutions, public attitudes
towards them, and -- perhaps most importantly --relations between the races for the
next century.
Over the previous half century, Americans had offered a variety of opinions about
what should be done with the Negroes once they were free. But no one had ever
seriously thought about the problems of resettling or resocializing a population which,
by 1860, numbered in excess of two million -- 90% of whom were slaves living in the
southern states. Even Lincoln himself, though a long-time opponent of slavery, was far
from sure about whether racial equality was either possible or desirable. As one
northern congressman put it, "this is a government of white men, made by white men,
for white men, to be administered, protected, defended, and maintained by white men"
(Shaw, 310). Only gradually -- and with the greatest reluctance -- were Lincoln and
other northerners won over to the idea that African Americans could and should
become citizens.
2
As with so many other major public initiatives, Union policies towards the former
slaves were developed incrementally and were shaped by a variety of contradictory
forces. Even though the course of the war remained uncertain as battle lines shifted
with victories and defeats, the North faced almost immediately the problem of dealing
with slaves. Despite the demands of the more radical elements in the his own
Republican Party, Lincoln resisted taking a definitive position on the legal status of
slaves behind Union lines in order to retain the loyalty of border states. So abolitionist
military commanders and political leaders took the initiative: in May of 1861,
Massachusetts' General Benjamin Butler, commanding Fortress Monroe in Virginia,
ruled that slaves escaping to his lines were "contraband of war" which he would not
return to their owners; three months later, General John C. Fremont issued a
proclamation freeing the slaves of Missourians who had taken up arms against the
United States; in May of 1862, General David Hunter emancipated the slaves in areas of
Georgia, Florida, and South Carolina under his control. Lincoln modified or nullified all
of these orders and pushed instead for a plan of compensated emancipation, under
which slaveholders would be paid for their human property.
Although Congress passed Lincoln's plan in August of 1861, anti-slavery sentiment
in Congress was strengthened by the increasing brutality of the war and the unceasing
agitation of the abolitionists. In April of 1862, Congress passed an act freeing all slaves
employed in arms or labor against the Union and (with compensation) all slaves in the
District of Columbia. In June, Congress acted to abolish slavery -- with compensation -in all the territories of the United States. A month later,
it liberated the slaves of all persons who committed treason or supported the rebellion.
By the fall of 1862, sensitive to the growing power of anti-slavery opinion both here
and abroad, Lincoln ordered "all persons held as slaves within any State, or designated
part of a State, whose people shall be in rebellion against the United States, shall
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thenceforward be forever free" (Shaw, 248) -- a position he would spell out in greater
detail in the Emancipation Proclamation of January of 1863.
To understand the process by which reconstruction policies were shaped, it is useful
to understand the peculiar nature of the Union Army. To begin with, it was far more
tied to the states -- and to state politics -- than the military is today. Though nominally
under federal control, most units were recruited, equipped, and paid by the states. And
their officers were more often chosen for their political skills than their military ones.
Accordingly, units from states where abolitionist sentiment ran strong, were often led
by officers with strong anti-slavery commitments and with close ties to abolitionist
organizations. While neither Congress nor the Executive branch were committed one
way or the other, each contained powerful leaders who part of the abolitionist network.
Chief among these were Senator Charles Sumner and Secretary of the Treasury,
Salmon P. Chase. Working together, key congressmen, military men, Secretary Chase,
and the anti-slavery organizations, would lay the foundations for the eventual
reconstruction of the South.
In November of 1861, the Union Navy, under the command of Commodore Samuel
F. Du Pont, took possession of the islands along the South Carolina coast. The planters,
who included some of the South's wealthiest leaders, fled -- leaving behind their
mansions, fields of maturing cotton, and some 10,000 slaves. Since Lincoln still favored
policies of compensated emancipation, there were no clearcut guidelines for dealing
with such abandoned property. But Treasury Secretary Chase, seeing both an
opportunity for increasing government revenues and for advancing abolitionist
schemes for emancipation, took charge of matters. In December of 1861, he sent
Lieutenant William H. Reynolds, an officer with the 1st Rhode Island Artillery (an in
civilian life, a cotton broker), to take charge of abandoned cotton in the islands.
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In the meantime, Chase became aware of the desperate situation of the Sea Island
slaves. In February of 1862, Commodore Du Pont wrote him that the 10,000 slaves
were "almost starving and some naked or nearly so" (Rose, 20). Without masters,
without work, without doctors, the slaves flocked to the army camps seeking help.
While Du Pont and General Sherman wrote to northern charitable organizations
requesting help, others, including New York Tribune correspondent George W. Smalley
reported on the deteriorating situation for northern press and exerted their influence to
move political leaders like Sumner.
One of the most influential articles on the problem was written by Boston attorney
Edward L. Pierce. Although well-connected politically, having worked in Salmon P.
Chase's Cincinnati law office and served as his secretary, Pierce had enlisted as a private
in the Third Massachusetts Infantry. While serving in the Sea Islands, Private Pierce
came face-to-face with the question of how the Union should deal with slaves in
captured rebel territories. After returning to Boston in the fall of 1861, he wrote an
influential article for the Atlantic, "The Contrabands at Fortress Monroe" (1861), which
described their situation and outlined the political opportunities they presented to the
Union. Pierce was, as his article makes clear, hardly a disinterested observer (he later
became vice-president of the New England Freedmen's Aid Society and served on the
governing board of the American Freedmen's Union Commission). A committed
abolitionist, Pierce opposed Lincoln's cautious policies, strongly advocated immediate
emancipation, and used his observations on the "contrabands" to support his arguments
for permitting freed slaves to serve in the armed forces and to obtain full rights as
citizens. He also suggested that the government undertake efforts to educate the freed
slaves, to provide them with remunerative work, and to provide them with churches.
5
Edward L. Pierce, THE CONTRABANDS AT FORTRESS MONROE
On the morning of the 22d of May last, Major General Butler, welcomed with a military
salute, arrived at Fortress Monroe, and assumed command of the Department of Virginia. . . .
On the 23d of May General Butler ordered the first reconnoitring expedition, which consisted of
a part of the Vermont Regiment, and proceeded under the command of Colonel Phelps over the
dike and bridge towards Hampton. They were anticipated, and when in sight of the second
bridge saw that it had been set on fire, and, hastening forward, extinguished the flames. The
detachment then marched into the village. A parley was held with a Secession officer, who
represented the men in arms in Hampton were only a domestic police. Meanwhile the white
inhabitants, particularly the women, had generally disappeared. The negroes gathered around
our men, and their evident exhilaration was particularly noted, some of them saying, "Glad
[626] to see you, Massa," and betraying the fact that, on the approach of the detachment, a
field piece stationed at the bridge had been thrown into the sea. This was the first
communication between our army and the negroes in this department.
The reconnaissance of the day had more important results than were anticipated. Three,
negroes, owned by Colonel Mallory, a lawyer of Hampton and a Rebel officer, taking advantage
of the terror prevailing among the white inhabitants, escaped from their master, skulked during
the afternoon, and in the night came to our pickets. The next morning, May 24th, they were
brought to General Butler, and there, for the first time, stood the Major-General and the fugitive
slave face to face. Being carefully interrogated, it appeared that they were field-hands, the
slaves of an officer in the Rebel service, who purposed taking them to Carolina to be employed
in military operations there. Two of them had wives in Hampton, one a free colored woman,
and they had several children in the neighborhood. Here was a new question, and a grave one,
on which the Government had as yet developed no policy. In the absence of precedents or
instructions, an analogy drawn from international law was applied. Under that law,
contraband goods, which are directly auxiliary to military operations, cannot in time of war be
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imported by neutrals into an enemy's country, and may be seized as lawful prize when the
attempt is made so to import them. It will be seen, that, accurately speaking, the term applies
exclusively to the relation between a belligerent and a neutral, and not to the relation between
belligerents. Under the strict law of nations, all the property of an enemy may be seized.
Under the Common Law, the property of traitors is forfeit. The humaner usage of modern times
favors the waiving of these strict rights, but allows, without question, the seizure and
Confiscation of all such goods as are immediately auxiliary to military purposes. These ablebodied negroes, held as slaves, were to be employed to build breastworks, to transport or store
provisions, to serve as cooks or waiters, and even to bear arms. Regarded as property,
according to their master's claim, they could be efficiently used by the Rebels for the purposes of
the Rebellion, and most efficiently by the Government in suppressing it. Regarded as persons,
they had escaped from communities where a triumphant rebellion had trampled on the laws,
and only the rights of human nature remained, and they now asked the protection of the
Government, to which, in prevailing treason, they were still loyal, and which they were ready to
serve as best they could.
The three negroes, being held contraband of war, were at once set to work to aid the
masons in constructing a new bakehouse within the fort. Thenceforward the term "contraband "
bore a new signification, with which it will pass into history, designating the negroes who had
been held as slaves, now adopted under the protection of the Government. It was used in
official communications at the fort. It was applied familiarly to the negroes, who stared
somewhat inquiring, "What d'ye call us that for?" Not having Wheaton's "Elements" at hand,
we did not attempt an explanation. The contraband notion was adopted by Congress in the
Act of July 6th, which confiscates slaves used in aiding the Insurrection. There is often great
virtue in such technical phrases in shaping public opinion. They commend practical action to a
class of minds little developed in the direction of the sentiments, which would be repelled by
formulas of a broader and nobler import. The venerable gentleman, who wears gold spectacles
7
and reads a conservative daily, prefers confiscation to emancipation. He is reluctant to have
slaves declared freemen, but has no objection to their being declared contrabands. His whole
nature rises in insurrection when Beecher preaches in a sermon that a thing ought to be done
because it is a duty, but he yields gracefully when Butler issues an order commanding it to be
done because it is a military necessity.
[628] On the next day, Major John B. Cary, another Rebel officer, late principal of an
academy in Hampton, a delegate to the Charleston Convention, and a seceder with General
Butler from the Convention at Baltimore, came to the fort with a flag of truce, and, claiming to
act as the representative of Colonel Mallory, demanded the fugitives. He reminded General
Butler of his obligations under the Federal Constitution, under which he claimed to act. The
ready reply was, that the Fugitive Slave Act could not be invoked for the reclamation of
fugitives from a foreign State, which Virginia claimed to be, and she must count it among the
infelicities of her position, if so far at least she was taken at her word.
The three pioneer negroes were not long to be isolated from their race. There was no
known channel of communication between them and their old comrades, and yet those
comrades knew, or believed with the certainty of knowledge, how they had been received. If
inquired of whether more were coming, their reply was, that, if they were not sent back, others
would understand that they were among friends, and more would come the next day. Such is
the mysterious spiritual telegraph which runs through the slave population. Proclaim an edict
of Emancipation in the presence of a single slave on the Potomac, and in a few days it will be
known by his brethren on the Gulf. So on the night of the Big Bethel affair, a squad of negroes,
meeting our soldiers, inquired anxiously the way to "the freedom fort."
The means of communication with the fort from the open country became more easy,
when, on the 24th of May, the same day on which the first movement was made from
8
Washington into Virginia, the Second New York Regiment made its encampment on the Segar
farm, lying near the bridge which connected the fort with the main-land, an encampment soon
enlarged by the First Vermont and other New York regiments. On Sunday morning May 26th,
eight negroes stood before the quarters of General Butler, waiting for an audience. They were
examined in part by the Hon. Mr. Ashley, M. C. from Ohio, then a visitor at the fort. On May
27th, forty seven negroes of both sexes and all ages, from three months to eighty-five years,
among whom were half a dozen entire families, came in one squad. Another lot of a dozen
good field-hands arrived the same day; and then they continued to come by twenties, thirties,
and forties. They were assigned buildings outside of the fort or tents within. They were set to
work as servants to officers, or to store provisions landed from vessels, thus relieving us of the
fatigue duty which we had previously done, except that of dragging and mounting columbiads
on the ramparts of the fort, a service which some very warm days have impressed on my
memory. . . .
It was now time to call upon the Government for a policy in dealing with slave society thus
disrupted and disorganized. Elsewhere, even under the shadow of the Capitol, the action of
military officers had been irregular, and in some cases in palpable violation of personal rights.
An order of General McDowell excluded all slaves from the lines. Sometimes officers assumed
to decide the question whether a negro was a slave, and deliver him to a claimant, when,
certainly in the absence of martial law, they had no authority in the premises, under the Act of
Congress, that power being confided to commissioners and marshals. As well might a member
of [629] Congress or a State sheriff usurp the function. Worse yet, in defiance of the Common
Law, they made color a presumptive proof of bondage. In one case a free negro was delivered
to a claimant under this process, more summary than any which the Fugitive Slave Act
provides. The colonel of a Massachusetts regiment showed some practical humor in dealing
with a pertinacious claimant, who asserted title to a negro found within his lines, and had
brought a policeman along with him to aid in enforcing it. The shrewd colonel, (a Democrat he
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is,) retaining the policeman, put both the claimant and claimed outside of the lines together to
try their fleetness. The negro proved to be the better gymnast and was heard of no more. This
capricious treatment of the subject was fraught with serious difficulties as well as personal
injuries, and it needed to be displaced by authorized system.
On the 27th of May, General Butler, having in a previous communication reported his
interview with Major Cary, called the attention of the War Department to the subject in a
formal despatch, --inflicting the hostile purposes for which the negroes had been or might be
successfully used, stating the course he had pursued in employing them and recording expenses
and services, and suggesting the pertinent military, political, and humane considerations. The
Secretary of War, under the date of the 30th of May, replied, cautiously approving the course of
General Butler, and intimating distinctions between interfering with the relations of persons held
to service and refusing to surrender them to their alleged masters, which it is not easy to
reconcile with well- defined views of the new exigency, or at least with a desire to express them.
The note was characterized by diplomatic reserve which it will probably be found difficult long
to maintain.
The ever-recurring question continued to press for solution. On the 6th of July the Act of
Congress was approved, declaring that any person claiming the labor of another to be due to
him, and permitting such party to be employed in any military or naval service whatsoever
against the Government of the United States, shall forfeit his claim to such labor, and proof of
such employment shall thereafter be a full answer to the claim. This act was designed for the
direction of the civil magistrate, and not for the limitation of powers derived from military law.
That law, founded on salus republicae, transcends all codes, and lies outside of forms and
statutes. John Quincy Adams, almost prophesying as he expounded, declared, in 1842, that
under it slavery might be abolished. Under it, therefore, Major-General Fremont, in a recent
proclamation, declared the slaves of all persons within his department, who were in arms
10
against the Government, to be freemen, and under it has given title-deeds of manumission.
Subsequently President Lincoln limited the proclamation to such slaves as are included in the
Act of Congress, namely, the slaves of Rebels used in directly hostile service. The country had
called for Jacksonian courage, and its first exhibition was promptly suppressed. If the
revocation was made in deference to protests from Kentucky, it seems, that, while the loyal
citizens of Missouri appeared to approve the decisive measure, they were overruled by the more
potential voice of other communities who professed to understand their affairs better than they
themselves. But if, as is admitted, the commanding officer, in the plenitude of military power,
was authorized to make the order within his department, all human beings included in the
proclamation thereby acquired a vested title to their freedom, of which neither Congress nor
President could dispossess them. No conclusive behests of law necessitating the limitation, it
cannot rest on any safe reasons of military policy. The one slave who carries his master's
knapsack on a march contributes far less to the efficiency of the Rebel army than the one
hundred slaves who hoe corn on his plantation with which to replenish its commissariat. We
have not yet emerged from [630]
the fine-drawn distinctions of peaceful times. We may imprison or slaughter a Rebel, but we
may not unloose his hold on a person he has claimed as a slave. We may seize all his other
property without question, lands, houses, cattle, jewels; but his asserted property in man is
more sacred than the gold which overlay the Ark of the Covenant, and we may not profane it.
This reverence for things assumed to be sacred, which are not so, cannot long continue. The
Government can well turn away from the enthusiast, however generous his impulses, who asks
the abolition of slavery on general principles of philanthropy, for the reason that it already has
work enough on its hands. It may not change the objects of the war, but it must of necessity at
times shift its tactics and its instruments, as the exigency demands. Its solemn and imperative
duty is to look every issue, however grave and transcendent, firmly in the face; and having
ascertained upon mature and conscientious reflection what is necessary to suppress the
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Rebellion, it must then proceed with inexorable purpose to inflict the blows where Rebellion is
the weakest and under which it must inevitably fall.
On the 30th of July, General Butler, being still unprovided with adequate instructions, -the number of contrabands having now reached nine hundred, applied to the War Department
for further directions. His inquiries, inspired by good sense and humanity alike, were of the
most fundamental character, and when they shall have received a full answer the war will be
near its end. Assuming the slaves to have been the property of masters, he considers them
waifs abandoned by their owners, in which the Government as a finder cannot, however,
acquire a proprietary interest, and they have therefore reverted to the normal condition of those
made in God's image, "if not free-born, yet free-manumitted, sent forth from the hand that held
them, never to return." The author of that document may never win a victor's laurels on any
renowned field, but, depositing it in the archives of the Government, he leaves a record in
history which will outlast the traditions of battle or siege. It is proper to add, that the answer of
the War Department, so far as its meaning is clear, leaves the General uninstructed as to all
slaves not confiscated by the Act of Congress. . . .
[632] A member of Brigadier-General Pierce's staff -- an efficient officer and a humane
gentleman -- suggested the employment of the contrabands and the furnishing of them with
rations, an expedient bast for them and agreeable to us. He at once dictated a telegram to
General Butler in these words: --"Shall we put the contrabands to work on the intrenchments,
and will you furnish them with rations?" An affirmative answer was promptly received on
Monday morning, July 8th, and that was the first day in the course of the war in which the negro
was employed upon the military works of our army. It therefore marks a distinct epoch in its
progress and in its relations to the colored population. The writer -- and henceforth in this
narrative I must indulge in the frequent use of the first person -- was specially detailed from his
post as a private in Company L of the Third Regiment to collect the contrabands, record their
12
names, ages, and the names of their masters, provide their tools, superintend their labor, and
procure their rations. My comrades smiled, as I undertook the novel duty, enjoying the
spectacle [633] of a Massachusetts Republican converted into a Virginia slave-master. To me it
seemed rather an opportunity to lead them from the house of bondage never to return. For,
whatever may be the general duty to this race, to all such as we have in any way employed to
aid our armies the national faith and our personal code of honor are pledged. Abandoning one
of those faithful allies, who, if delivered up, would be reduced to severer servitude because of
the education he had received and the services he had performed, probably to be transported to
the remotest slave region as now too dangerous to remain near its borders, we should be
accursed among the nations of the earth. I felt assured that from that hour, whatsoever the
fortunes of the war, every one of those enrolled defenders of the Union had vindicated beyond
all future question, for himself, his wife, and his issue, a title to American citizenship, and
become heir to all the immunities of Magna Carta, the Declaration of Independence, and the
Constitution of the United States. . . .
[634] The contrabands worked well, and in no instance was it found necessary for the
superintendents to urge them. There was a public opinion among them against idleness, which
answered for discipline. Some days they worked with our soldiers, and it was found that they
did more work, and did the nicer parts -- the facings and dressings -- better. Colonels Packard
and Wardrop, under whose direction the [635] breastworks were constructed, and General
Butler, who visited them, expressed satisfaction with the work which the contrabands had
done. On the 14th of July, Mr. Russell, of the London "Times," and Doctor Bellows, of the
Sanitary Commission, came to Hampton and manifested much interest at the success of the
experiment. The result was, indeed, pleasing. A subaltern officer, to whom I had insisted that
the contrabands should be treated with kindness, had sneered at the idea of applying
philanthropic notions in time of war. It was found then, as always, that decent persons will
accomplish more when treated at least like human beings. . . .
13
[636] During our encampment at Hampton, I occupied much of my leisure time in
conversations with the contrabands, both at their work and in their shanties, endeavoring to
collect their currents of thought and feeling. . . .
[639] The conversations of the contrabands on their title to be regarded as freemen showed
reflection. When asked if they thought themselves fit for freedom, and if the darkies were not
lazy, their answer was, "Who but the darkies cleared all the land around here? Yes, there are
lazy darkies, but there are more lazy whites." When told that the free blacks had not
succeeded, they answered that the free blacks have not had a fair chance under the laws, -- that
they don't dare to enforce their claims against white men. . . . Broken as was their speech and
limited as was their knowledge, they reasoned abstractly on their rights as well as white men.
Locke or Channing might have fortified the argument for universal liberty from their simple talk.
So true is it that the best thoughts which the human intellect has produced have come, not from
affluent learning or ornate speech, but from the original elements of our nature, common to all
races of men and all conditions in life; and genius the highest and most cultured may bend with
profit to catch the lowliest of human utterances.
There was a very general desire among the contrabands to know how to read. A few
had learned; and these, in every instance where we inquired as to their teacher, had been taught
on the sly in their childhood by their white playmates. Others knew their letters, but could not
"put them together," as they said. I remember of a summer's afternoon seeing a young married
woman, perhaps twenty-five years old, seated on a door-step with her primer before her, trying
to make progress.
In natural tact and the faculty of getting a livelihood the contrabands are inferior to the
Yankees, but quite equal to the mass of the Southern population. It is not easy to see why they
would be less industrious, if free, than the whites, particularly as they would have the
14
encouragement of wages. There would be transient difficulties at the outset, but no more than a
bad system lasting for ages might be expected to leave behind. The first generation might be
unfitted for the active duties and responsibilities of citizenship; but this difficulty, under
generous provisions for education, would not pass to the next. Even now they are not so much
behind the masses of the whites. Of the Virginians who took the oath of allegiance at Hampton,
not more than one in fifteen could write his name, and the rolls captured at Hatteras disclose an
equally deplorable ignorance. The contrabands might be less addicted than the now dominant
race to bowie-knives and duels, think less of the value of bludgeons as forensic arguments, be
less inhospitable to innocent sojourners from Free States, and have far inferior skill in robbing
forts and arsenals, [640] plundering the Treasury, and betraying the country at whose crib they
had fattened; but mankind would forgive them for not acquiring these accomplishments of
modern treason. As a race, they may be less vigorous and thrifty than the Saxon, but they are
more social, docile, and affectionate, fulfilling the theory which Channing held in relation to
them, if advanced to freedom and civilization.
If in the progress of the war they should be called to bear arms, there need be no
reasonable apprehension that they would exhibit the ferocity of savage races. Unlike such, they
have been subordinated to civilized life. They are by nature a religious people. They have
received an education in the Christian faith from devout teachers of their own and of the
dominant race. Some have been taught (let us believe it) by the precepts of Christian masters,
and some by the children of those masters, repeating the lessons of the Sabbath-school. The
slaveholders assure us that they have all been well treated. If that be so, they have no wrongs
to avenge. Associated with our army, they would conform to the stronger and more disciplined
race. Nor is this view disproved by servile insurrections. In those cases, the insurgents, without
arms, without allies, without discipline, but throwing themselves against society, against
government, against everything saw no other escape than to devastate and destroy without
15
mercy in order to get a foothold. If they exterminated, it was because extermination was
threatened against them. In the Revolution, in the army at Cambridge, from the beginning to the
close of the war, against the protests of South Carolina by the voice of Edward Rutledge, but
with the express sanction of Washington, --ever just, ever grateful for patriotism, whencesoever
it came,-- negroes fought in the ranks with the white men, and they never dishonored the patriot
cause. So also at the defence of New Orleans they received from General Jackson a noble tribute
to their fidelity and soldierlike bearing. Weighing the question historically and reflectively, and
anticipating the capture of Richmond and New Orleans, there need be more serious
apprehension of the conduct of some of our own troops recruited in large cities than of a
regiment of contrabands officered and disciplined by white men.
But as events travel faster than laws or proclamations, already in this war with
Rebellion the two races have served together. The same breastworks have been built by their
common toil. True and valiant, they stood side by side in the din of cannonade, and they
shared as comrades in the victory of Hatteras. History will not fail to record that on the 28th
day of August, 1861, when the Rebel forts were bombarded by the Federal army and navy,
under the command of Major-General Butler and Commodore Stringham, fourteen negroes,
lately Virginia slaves, now contraband of war, faithfully and without panic worked the aftergun of the upper deck of the Minnesota, and hailed with a victor's pride the Stars and Stripes
as they again waved on the soil of the Carolinas.
16
THE PORT ROYAL EXPERIMENT
Northern leaders realized that the Sea Island situation would be a precedent for the
treatment of slaves in other areas coming under Union control. But they disagreed
about the policies the government should adopt. Many believed that slaves should
remain slaves, but should work for the government until Congress made some final
determination of their fate. Others saw an opportunity to "bring Yankee
industriousness to the Sea Islands" (Richardson, 1986, 18). They hoped to prove the
freedmen's worthiness by demonstrating that, as free labor, could be more productive
than slaves. This group included Edward L. Pierce and his colleagues who organized
the Boston Educational Commission. A third faction, the New York-based American
Missionary Society, combining abolitionist fervor with evangelical religion, felt that
"growing cotton was secondary to inculcating good morals and faithful family life and
teaching the alphabet to the freedmen" (18). Other groups, who pressed both religious
and more pragmatic goals, including the National Freedmen's Relief Association of
New York and the Port Royal Relief Committee of Philadelphia, joined in the
emancipationist effort.
In December of 1861, Pierce, now discharged from the army, was dispatched by
Treasury Secretary Chase to the Sea Islands under orders to initiate efforts to prepare
the Negroes "for self-support by their own industry" (Rose, 22). In the meantime, Rev.
Mansfield French, an agent of the American Missionary Association, an organization
with strong abolitionist commitments, arrived in the Sea Islands to see what voluntary
organizations could do for the "contrabands." The Association had already started day
and Sabbath schools in September and, within months, had begun sending food and
clothing to the Islands. These efforts increased as Pierce's written reports to Chase
were published by the northern press and read on the floor of Congress.
17
On March 3rd, 1862, Pierce set out for the Sea Islands with a group of fifty two
businessmen, clergymen, farmers, and teachers -- abolitionists determined to
demonstrate that the slaves, if freed, could support themselves, could exercise the
responsibilities of citizenship, and could, in wartime, be assets to the Union cause.
Boston financier, John Murray Forbes, who happened to be travelling on the same ship,
described his fellow passengers as a "'villainthropic' society, bearded and mustached
and odd-looking men, with odder-looking women. You would have doubted," he
wrote, suggesting that the group represented the extremes of Ante Bellum reformism,
"whether it was the adjournment of a John Brown meeting or the fag-end of the
broken-down phalanstery!" (Forbes 1899, I: 295-6).
Though the group faced skepticism and hostility, it was buoyed up by its own firm
commitment to the cause -- and by the backing of Secretary Chase, Senator Sumner,
and key military figures in the Islands. Its effort, which brought together volunteers,
private philanthropic resources, and governmental support, would prove to be a
paradigm of the whole reconstruction effort.
18
THE NEGROES AT PORT ROYAL, S.C.
REPORT OF THE GOVERNMENT AGENT
SECOND REPORT.
PORT ROYAL, June 2,1862.
To the Hon. S. P. Chase, Secretary of the Treasury:
SIR: Upon the transfer of the supervision of affairs at Port Royal from the Treasury to the
War Department, a summary of the results of this agency may be expected by you; and
therefore, this report is transmitted.
Your instructions of February nineteenth intrusted to me the general superintendence and
direction of such persons as might be employed upon the abandoned plantations, with a view
to prevent the deterioration of the estates, to secure their best possible cultivation, and the
greatest practicable benefit to the laborers upon them. The Department not being provided with
proper power to employ upon salaries superintendents and teachers, under the plan submitted
in my report of February third, enjoined cooperation with associations of judicious and humane
citizens in Boston, New York, and other cities, who proposed to commission and employ
persons for the religious instruction, ordinary education, and general and employment of the
laboring population. Authority was given to the Special Agent at the same time to select and
appoint applicants for such purposes, and assign each to his respective duty -- such persons
when compensated, to draw their compensation from private sources, receiving transportation,
subsistence, and quarters only from the Government. The Commission of Boston had already
been organized and the organization of the National Freedmen's Relief Association of New-York
followed a few days later. Still later the Port Royal Committee of Philadelphia was appointed.
On the morning of March ninth, forty-one men and twelve women, accepted for the above
purposes and approved by the first two of the Associations, disembarked at Beaufort, having
left New-York on the third of third of that month on board the United States transport, the
19
steamship Atlantic, accompanied by the Special Agent. The Educational Commission of
Boston had commissioned twenty-five of the men and four of the women. The National
Freedmen's Relief Association of New-York had commissioned sixteen of the men and five of
the women, and three women from Washington City has received your own personal
commendation. The men were of various occupations, farmers, men, teachers, physicians,
ranging in age from twenty-one to sixty years. Not being provided with full
topographical
knowledge of the islands, it was necessary for the Special Agent to explore them for locations.
At the close of the first fortnight after their arrival, the entire original delegation had been
assigned to the districts which they had reached. Since then others have arrived, namely,
fourteen on March twenty-third, fourteen on April fourteenth, and a few at a later date, making
in all seventy-four men and nineteen women, who having been commissioned by the
Associations, and receiving the permit of the Collector of New-York, havearrived here, and been
assigned to posts. Of the seventy-four men, forty-six were commissioned and employed by the
Boston Society, and twenty-eight by that of New-York. Of the nineteen women, nine were
commissioned by the New-York Society, six by that of Boston, one by that of Philadelphia, and
three others not so commissioned, but approved by yourself, were accepted. Except in the case
of the three women approved by yourself, no persons have been received into this service not
previously approved by the associations with whom you enjoined cooperation. Of the
seventy-four men, twenty-four were stationed on Port Royal Island, a few of these doing duty
at Beaufort, fifteen on St. Helena, thirteen on Ladies, nine on Edisto, seven on Hilton Head,
three on Pinckney, one on Cat and Cane, one on Paris, and one on Daufuskie. A few of the
above returned North soon after their arrival, so that the permanent number here at any one
time, duly commissioned and in actual service has not exceeded seventy men and sixteen
women. The number at present is sixty-two men and thirteen women. A larger corps of
superintendents and teachers might have been employed to advantage, but as injurious results
might attend the overdoing of the work of supervision, it was thought best not to receive more,
until experience had indicated the permanent need. . . .
20
[321] The contributions of clothing from the benevolent associations have been liberal; but
liberal as they have been, they have failed to meet the distressing want which pervaded the
territory. The, masters had left the negroes destitute, not having supplied their winter clothing
when our forces had arrived, so that both the winter and spring clothing had not been furnished.
From all accounts it would also seem that since the war began the usual amount of clothing
given had been much diminished. That contributed by the associations cannot fall below ten
thousand dollars. It has produced a most marked change in the general appearance,
particularly on Sundays and at the schools, and tended to inspire confidence in the
superintendents.
It would have been almost useless to attempt labors for moral or religious instruction without
the supplies thus sent to clothe the naked. A small amount where there were an ability and
desire to pay, has, with the special authority of the societies, been sold, and the proceeds
returned to them to be reinvested for the same purpose. The rest has been delivered, without
any money being received. In the case of the sick and disabled it is donated, and in case of
those healthy and able to work it has been charged without expectation of money to be paid,
that being thought to be the best course to prevent the laborers from regarding themselves as
paupers, and as a possible aid to the Government in case prompt payments for labor should
not be made.
It is most pleasing to state that with the small payments for labor already made, those also
for the collection of cotton being nearly completed, with the partial rations on some islands and
the supplies from benevolent sources on others, with the assistance which the mules have
furnished for the cultivation of the crop -- the general kindness and protecting care of the
superintendents -- the contributions of clothing forwarded by the associations -- the schools for
the instruction of the children and others desirous to learn -- with these and other favorable
influences, confidence in the Government has been inspired, the laborers are working cheerfully,
21
and they now present to the world the example of a well-behaved and self-supporting
peasantry of which their country has no reason to be ashamed.
The educational labors deserve a special statement. It is to be regretted that more teachers
had not been provided. The labor of superintendence at the beginning proved so onerous that
several originally intended to be put in charge of schools, were necessarily assigned for the other
purpose. Some fifteen persons on an average have been specially occupied with teaching, and
of these four were women. Others, having less superintendence to attend to, were able to
devote considerable time to teaching at regular hours. Nearly all give some attention to it, more
or less according to their opportunity, and their aptitude for the work.
The educational statistics are incomplete, only a part of the schools having been open for two
months, and the others having been opened at intervals upon the arrival of persons designated
for the purpose. At present according to the reports, two thousand five hundred persons am
being taught on week-days, of whom not far from one-third are adults taught when their work is
done. But this does not complete the number occasionally taught on week-days and at the
Sunday-schools. Humane soldiers have aided in the case of their servants and others. Three
thousand persons are in all probability receiving more or less instruction in reading on these
islands. With an adequate force of teachers this number might be doubled, as it is to be hoped
it will be on the coming of autumn. The reports state that very many are now advanced enough
so that even if the work should stop here they would still learn to read by themselves. Thus the
ability to read the English language has been already so communicated to these people that no
matter what military or social vicissitudes may come, this knowledge can never perish from
among them.
There have been forwarded to the Special Agent the reports of the teachers, and they result in
a remarkable concurrence of testimony. All unite universal eagerness to learn, which they have
22
not found equalled in white persons, arising both from the desire for knowledge common to all,
and the desire to raise their condition, now very strong among these people. The reports on this
point are cheering, even enthusiastic, and sometimes relate an incident of aspiration and
affection united in beautiful combination. One teacher on his first day's school, leaves in the
rooms a large alphabet card, and the next day returns to find a mother there teaching her little
child of three years to pronounce the first letters of the alphabet she herself learned the day
before. The children learn without urging by their parents, and as rapidly as white persons of
the same age, often more so, the progress being quickened by the eager desire.
One teacher reports that on the first day of her school only three or four knew a part of their
letters, and none knew all. In one week seven boys and six girls could read readily words of one
syllable, and the following week there were twenty in the same class. The cases of
dulness have not exceeded those among the whites. The mulattoes, of whom there are probably
not more than five per cent of the entire population on the plantations, are no brighter than the
children of pure African blood. In the schools which have been opened for some weeks, the
pupils who have regularly attended have passed from the alphabet, and are reading words of
one syllable in large and small letters. The lessons have been confined to reading and spelling,
except in a few cases where writing has been taught.
[322] There has been great apparent eagerness to learn among the adults and some have
progressed well. They will cover their books with care, each one being anxious to be thus
provided, carry them to the fields, studying them at intervals of rest, and asking explanations
of the superintendents who happen to come along. But as the novelty wore away, many of the
adults finding perseverance disagreeable, dropped off. Except in rare cases it is doubtful
whether adults over thirty years, although appreciating the privilege for their children, will
persevere in continuous study so as to acquire the knowledge for themselves. Still, when books
23
and newspapers are read in negro houses, many, inspired by the example of their children, will
be likely to undertake the labor again.
It is proper to state that while the memory in colored children is found to be, if any thing,
livelier than in the white, it is quite probable that further along, when the higher faculties of
comparison and combination are more to be relied on, their progress may be less. While their
quickness is apparent, one is struck with their want of discipline. The children have been
regarded as belonging to the plantation rather than to a family, and the parents, who in their
condition can never have but a feeble hold on their offspring, have not been instructed to
training their children into thoughtful and orderly habits. It has, therefore, been found not an
easy task to make them quiet and attentive at the schools.
Through the schools habits of neatness have been encouraged. Children with soiled faces or
soiled clothing, when known to have better, have been sent home from the schools, and have
returned in better condition.
In a few cases the teachers have been assisted by negroes who knew how to read before we
came. Of these there are very few. Perhaps one may be found on an average on one of two or
three plantations. These, so far as can be ascertained, were in most cases taught clandestinely,
often by the daughters of their masters who were of about the same age. A colored person
among these people who has learned to read does not usually succeed so well as a white
teacher. He is apt to teach the alphabet in the usual order, and needs special training for the
purpose.
The Sabbath-schools have assisted in the work of teaching. Some three hundred persons are
present at the church on St. Helena in the morning to be taught. There are other churches where
one or two hundred attend. A part of these, perhaps the larger, attend some of the day school,
24
but they comprehend others, as adults, and still others coming from localities where schools
have not been opened. One who regards spectacles in the light of their moral aspects, can with
difficulty find sublimer scenes than those witnessed on Sabbath morning on these islands, now
ransomed to a nobler civilization.
The educational labors have had incidental results almost as useful as those which have been
direct. At a time when the people were chafing [under] the most deprivation and the
assurances made on behalf of the Government were distrusted, it was fortunate that we could
point to the teaching of their children as a proof of our interest in their welfare, and of the new
and better life which we were opening before them.
An effort has been made to promote clean and healthful habits. To that end, weekly cleanings
of quarters were enjoined. This effort, where it could be properly made, met with reasonable
success. The negroes, finding that we took an interest in their welfare, acceded cordially, and in
many cases their diligence in this was most commendable. As a race, it is a mistake to suppose
that they indisposed to cleanliness. They appear to practice it as much as white people under
the same circumstances. There are difficulties to obstruct improvements in this respect. There
has been a scarcity of lime and (except at too high prices) of soap. Their houses are too small,
not affording proper apartments for storing their food. They are unprovided with glass
windows. Besides some of them are tenements unfit for beasts, without floor or chimneys. One
could not put on face to ask the occupants to clean such a place. But where the building was
decent or reasonably commodious, there was no difficulty in securing the practice of this virtue.
Many of these people are examples of tidiness, and on entering their houses one is sometimes
witness of rather amusing scenes where a mother is trying the effect of beneficent ablutions on
the heads of her children.
25
The religious welfare of these people has not been neglected. The churches, which were closed
when this became a seat of war, have been opened. Among the superintendents there were
several persons of clerical education, who have led in public ministrations. The larger part of
them are persons of religious experience and profession, who, on the Sabbath, in weekly praise
meetings and at funerals, have labored for the consolation of these humble believers.
These people have been assured by the Special Agent that if they proved themselves worthy
by their industry, good order, and sobriety, they should be protected against their rebel masters.
It would be wasted toil to attempt their development without such assurances. An honorable
nature would shrink from this work without the right to make them. Nor is it possible to
imagine any rulers now or in the future who will ever turn their backs on the laborers who have
been received, as these have been, into the service of the United States.
Special care has been taken to protect the property of the Government on the plantations. The
cattle had been taken away in such large numbers by the former owners, and later by the army,
the latter sometimes slaughtering fifty or head on a plantation, that the necessity of a
strict rule for the preservation of those remaining was felt. For that purpose the Special Agent
procured orders from the military and naval authorities, dated respectively April seventeenth
and twenty-sixth, forbidding #he removal of "subsistence, [323] forage, mules, horses, oxen,
cows, sheep, cattle of any kind, or other property, from the plantations, without the consent of
the Special Agent of the Treasury Department or orders from the nearest General Commanding."
No such consent has been given by the Special Agent except in one case, as an act of mercy to
the animal, and in another where he ordered a lamb killed on a special occasion, and has
charged himself with the same in his account with the department Your instructions which
expressed your desire to prevent the deterioration of the estates, have in this respect been
sedulously attended to. The superintendents have not been permitted to kill cattle, even for
26
fresh meat, and they have subsisted on their rations, and fish and poultry purchased of the
negroes.
The success of the movement, now upon its third month, has exceeded my most sanguine
expectations. It has had its peculiar difficulties, and some phases at times, arising from
accidental causes, might on a partial view invite doubt, banished however at once by a general
survey of what had been done. Already, the high treason of South-Carolina has had a sublime
compensation, and the end is not yet. The churches which were closed have been opened. No
master now stands between these people and the words which the Savior spoke for the
consolation of all peoples and all generations. The Gospel is preached in fullness and purity, as
it has never before been preached in this territory, even in colonial times. The reading of the
English language, with more or less system, is being taught to thousands, so that whatever
military or political calamities may be in store, this precious knowledge can never more be
eradicated. Ideas and habits have been planted, under the growth of which these people are to
be fitted for the responsibilities of citizenship, and in equal degree unfitted for any restoration
to what they have been. Modes of administration have been commenced, not indeed adapted
to an advanced community, but just, paternal, and developing in their character. Industrial
results have been reached, which put at rest the often reiterated assumption that this territory
and its products can only be cultivated by slaves. A social problem which has vexed the wisest
approaches a solution. The capacity of a race, and the possibility of lifting it to civilization
without danger or disorder, even without throwing away the present generation as refuse, are
being determined. And thus the way is preparing by which the peace, to follow this war shall
be made perpetual.
Finally, it would seem that upon this narrow theatre, and in these troublous times, God is
demonstrating against those who would mystify his plans and thwart his purposes, that in the
councils of his infinite wisdom he has predestined no race, not even the African, to the doom of
eternal bondage.
27
There are words of personal gratitude which it is not easy to suppress. To the
superintendents, who have treated me with uniform kindness and subordination; to the Rev. Dr.
Peck, to whom was assigned the charge of the general interests of Port Royal Island; to the Rev.
Mr. French, who was charged with special duties; to the benevolent associations in Boston, New
York, and Philadelphia, without whose support and contributions, amounting, in salaries and
donations of specific articles, to not less than twenty thousand dollars, this enterprise could not
have been carried on or commenced; to the Flag Officer of the Squadron and the Generals
commanding, for facilities cheerfully afforded, particularly to Brigadier-General Stevens, to
whom, as Port Royal Ladies', and St. Helena Islands, were all within his district, it was
necessary often to apply; to the Collector of New-York, without whom the business operations
have been conducted; to yourself, for confidence intrusted and continued, I am under special
obligations.
But, more than all, in parting with the interesting people who have been under my charge, I
must bear testimony to their uniform kindness to myself. One of them has been my faithful
guide and attendant, doing for me more service than any white man could render. They have
come, even after words of reproof or authority, to express confidence and good resolves. They
have given me their benedictions and prayers, and I should be ungrateful indeed ever to forget of
deny them. I am your friend and servant,
EDWARD L. PIERCE
Special Agent of the Treasury Department
28
Pierce's initial reports on the efforts of the "Gideonites," as they came to be known,
were sanguine. And even dubious contemporaries like John Murray Forbes were
impressed by their efforts. In May of 1862, Forbes wrote to fellow Bostonian Edward
Atkinson his appraisal of events in the Sea Islands.
J.M. FORBES TO EDWARD ATKINSON.
BOSTON, May 23, 1862.
MY DEAR SIR,-- . . .I would gladly do anything, except come before the public, to help your
good work. You may use my testimony in any other way than over my signature, and the
indorsements of the "Daily"' and other journals would seem to answer all purposes. I have
watched the Educational Commission from its very inception with the greatest interest, and,
while in Secessia, had every opportunity to gauge it, not only by the criticisms of its many
enemies, and by the statements of its friends, but by personal observation. It was started very
late, and when only the most prompt and even hasty measures gave it a chance of success.
These measures were taken chiefly at Boston, with that efficiency which marks our good city
and State. A large number of [310] volunteers were hurried from various pursuits, down into
South Carolina, where, in about ten days after the enterprise was first thought of, they found
themselves landed, with bare floors to sleep upon, soldier's rations to eat, and the obloquy and
ridicule of all around them for "sauce piquanter"
Under all their inexperience, and all these disadvantages, they have worked their way
quietly on, and up to the time when I left, May 14th, when the new rule of military governor was
about beginning, they had accomplished the following results.
First and foremost. They had inspired confidence in the blacks by their kindness, and
especially by their bringing the first boon which these forlorn creatures had received from us,
namely, an opportunity for education. In all else the negroes have been materially worse off than
29
under their old masters, - with only their scanty ration of Indian corn, no shoes, blankets,
clothing, molasses, or other necessaries, and no luxuries given them, of which they formerly had
a moderate allowance. Against all this they had only the doubtful advantage of idleness or
precarious employment, and the promises of the cotton agents. It was a great point to put over
them intelligent and Christian teachers, and this they have fully appreciated.
Second. The material benefits which have resulted, namely: beginning very late, the
forces of the plantation have been organized to reasonably steady labor; a full crop of food has
been planted in common, besides many much larger private, or, as
[311] these are called, "Negro Grounds," planted than ever before. I saw repeatedly whole gangs
who had finished their plantation work by ten A. M., and bad all the rest of the day for their
own patches, some of which are four or five times as large as usual.
Third. In addition to the food crop, enough cotton land has been planted to give the
negroes, if they are allowed to take care of the crop and enjoy its fruits, more of the necessaries
and indeed comforts of life than they have ever had before.
To sum up, we have then for some of the results
The confidence of the blacks;
The education, so far as it goes;
The encouragement of industry; and
The material advantage of food and cotton crops;
instead of leaving the negroes alone to run into vice and pauperism, or turning them over to the
tender mercies of hard speculators.
Of course, the agents of the commission have made mistakes in some cases, and some of
them have been ill chosen, and have helped the enemies of the enterprise to bring it into local
discredit; but generally the whole has been a most successful undertaking, and most of those
30
Sent from this quarter have, by their patience, faithfulness, and disinterested zeal, been a credit
to Massachusetts. They, as a whole, form a noble band of men and women. They have had
everything to contend with especially the opposition of many with whose [312] interests they
interfered, and of others whose prejudices they offended. Their predecessors on the plantations,
the cotton agents and militarys had begun to look upon themselves as the successors to the
planters, entitled to the use of all that was left, houses, horses, negroes, crops.
When the agents of the commission came down to take charge of the plantations, they
were looked upon as interlopers, and in most cases every obstacle, short of absolute
disobedience to the orders of the commanding general, was thrown in their way. All the little
mistakes of the new-comers were magnified; all the good they did ignored, and a local public
opinion thus created against them, which many of our own soldiers, who ought to have known
better, gave in to. "What a ridiculous thing for these philanthropists to come down and teach
the stupid negroes, and occupy the plantations, and use the secesh ponies which had been so
convenient for our pickets!"
Such was the natural feeling of the unthinking, and of some who ought to have reflected.
This false opinion was largely availed of by the "Herald" and other kindred papers, to create
prejudice at the North against an enterprise aiming to improve the condition of the blacks. How
much more satisfactory to this class would it have been to have had the negroes left to their
own devices, and then given all the enemies of improvement a chance to say, "We told you so!
The negroes are worse off than before, -- idle, vicious, paupers. The sooner you reduce [313]
them to slavery again, and the more firmly you bind the rest of their race to eternal slavery, the
better! " It would take too long to go into the question of what is to be done hereafter; but there
was an emergency three months ago which has, in my opinion, been successfully met; and
among other results I believe you will have the testimony of all who have been engaged in the
experiment, that it has distinctly proved that the negro has the same selfish element in him
which induces other men to labor. Give him only a fair prospect of benefit from his labor, and he
31
will work like other human beings. Doubtless hereafter this selfish element must be appealed to
more than it could be by the agents of the commission. There must be less working in common,
and more done for the especial benefit of each laborer. It is much to establish the fact that this
element of industry exists.
In conclusion, I consider the Educational Commission up to this time a decided success. I
congratulate you and your associates upon having added another to the good deeds of
Massachusetts, not by any means forgetting the share which New York has had in the good
work; and I sincerely hope that General Saxton, cooperating with you, may in a manner worthy
of his high reputation complete what has been so well begun.
In fact, opinions about the success of the Port Royal Experiment differed. While
skeptics like Forbes became enthusiastic supporters and would use their considerable
influence to push for the government to use its efforts as a model for more ambitious
reconstruction efforts throughout the South, many others remained unconvinced -- and
in many cases openly hostile. It seems clear that the kinds of racist attitudes that fueled
the 1863 Draft Riots in New York, in which hundreds of blacks were killed by mobs,
were common in the lower levels of the military -- and through much of the political
establishment as well. Thus, while advocates like Pierce emphasized the positive in
writing of the experiment, the unreported realities were far grimmer. Freed blacks
were subjected to constant abuse and physical threat from Union soldiers, who raped
and stole their crops. The threat of being returned to slavery -- despite the promises of
the "Gideonites" -- hung over their heads. Further, many blacks not unreasonably
resisted the paternalism of the reformers, questioning efforts to make them plant
cotton, when they would have preferred to cultivate crops which they themselves could
use and sell. Still, most were persuaded that even this limited form of freedom was
32
preferable to slavery and most leapt at the chance to bear arms for the Union -- another
major goal of the abolitionists -- once the opportunity was offered.
Later historians of the Port Royal Experiment also differ in their appraisal of its
success. Forbes's daughter, echoing the views of elite Boston reformers, would acclaim
the contributions of the effort in commenting on her father's observations. "The
commission did turn out a practical success and a 'positive good to the blacks," she
wrote, "as any one can learn who will pay a visit to their descendants on the Sea Islands
at the present day" (Forbes 1899, I:301). But Willie Lee Rose, whose Rehearsal for
Reconstruction (1964) is the most detailed account of the effort, provides a far more
critical view. She believes the northern reformers, who believed that freedom and
education could alone "make another Massachusetts of South Carolina" (385), were
hopelessly naive. Perhaps their efforts would have succeeded had the government
been more firmly committed and more generous. As it was, the government gave
only a lukewarm endorsement and provided almost no material support at all. Almost
everything that was done was based on private resources -- and these tended to
diminish over time. In effect, northern philanthropists declared the experiment a
success and walked away, leaving the volunteers in the field to fare as best they could
against the resistance of the blacks and the open hostility of the military. By the 1870s,
the old slavocracy was back in power and the freedmen were little better off than they
had been before the war. Thus, as Rose suggests, the experiment was indeed a
rehearsal for Reconstruction, both in the high hopes with which it was launched and in
the betrayal and failure that marked its collapse.
WITH MALICE TOWARD NONE? WITH CHARITY FOR ALL?
The turning of the tide of war in the Union's favor after McClellan's victory at
Antietam in the fall of 1862 and Grant's capture of Vicksburg in the spring of 1863,
33
rather than uniting the nation behind Lincoln, only served to intensify differences over
how the defeated South -- and its millions of former slaves -- should be treated. The
lawyerly and politically astute Lincoln was reluctant to confiscate southern properties,
to punish citizens of the Confederacy, or to enfranchise former slaves. Democrats, who
remained the majority party in key states of the North despite the treason of their
southern brethren, as well as many moderate Republicans, endorsed Lincoln's cautious
policies. But the Radical Republicans in Congress were increasingly unhappy. Arguing
that the southern states had forfeited their civil liberties when they seceded, pushed
ever harder for immediate emancipation and enfranchisement of the freedmen, and for
punitive policies towards the captured South.
In the meantime, confusion reigned, with officers in the field dealing with the blacks
as they saw fit: Generals Halleck and Williams prohibited slaves from entering military
camps; General Buel allowed slave-owners to come within Union lines to recover their
human property; General Fremont, in command of Missouri, and General Hunter, in
command of Georgia, Florida, and South Carolina, proclaimed the slaves under their
jurisdiction free; General Butler refused to return slaves to their owners and put them
to work for the army. This confusion not only reflected the weakness and ambiguity of
Lincoln's position, under which he evidently hoped to save the Union without
destroying the South's "peculiar institution," but also the peculiarity of a citizen army in
which many of the officers had been politically active in their civilian lives and had
carried their convictions into the field.
Although Congress acted in March of 1862 to prohibit the military from returning
fugitive slaves to their masters, their legal status remained unclear. More seriously, as
ever greater numbers of blacks either fled behind Union lines and as Union forces
34
advanced into the Confederacy, their situation became ever more desperate. As
General Oliver Howard would write,
millions had left their places of work and abode and had become indeed
nomadic, wandering wherever want drove or untutored inclination enticed
them. They had drifted into nooks and corners like debris into sloughs and
eddies; and were very soon to be found in varied ill-conditioned masses, all the
way from Maryland to Mexico, and from the Gulf to the Ohio River. An awful
calamitous breaking-up of a thoroughly organized society; dark desolation lay in
its wake" (Howard, 1907, II: 164).
Despite this, Congress and the President seemed unable to react effectively -- and
initiative was left to the army. Fortunately, rising stars like U.S. Grant were not
unsympathetic to the plight of the "contrabands." After occupying Grand Junction,
Mississippi in November of 1862, where hundreds of slaves, abandoned by their
owners, fled to the Union Army for protection, Grant introduced a plan of relief.
Selecting John Eaton, Chaplain of the Twenty-seventh Ohio Volunteers as Chief of
Negro Affairs for the district under his jurisdiction, Grant ordered the fugitive put to
work harvesting crops, cutting fuel, and doing other essential tasks in support of the
military effort. For this work they were paid wages and supplied with housing,
clothing, and medical care. Later, in his memoirs, Grant would claim that the idea for
the Freedmen's Bureau originated with him.
Though this is certainly not the case, Grant's sponsorship of these initially modest -but subsequently more ambitious --initiatives unquestionably made a difference, since
the efforts of the nation's greatest military hero could not be so easily dismissed as the
work of abolitionists. Again, Grant and his subordinates took an experimental
approach. While many fugitives work directly for the government, others worked on
plantations which the army leased to private owners. Still others were, called
"Freedmen's Home Colonies," leased to the blacks themselves. In the meantime, Grant
invited the assistance of northern benevolent associations to build schools, churches,
hospitals, and orphanages.
35
Certainly the most dramatic steps were taken my General William T. Sherman in the
course of his devastating march to the sea through the Carolinas and Georgia.
Undertaken with the explicit purpose of destroying the South farms, factories, and
railroads, Sherman was keenly aware of the impact his march would have on the black
population -- and he proceeded without hesitation to grant it economic and political
rights.
36
FORTY ACRES AND A MULE
War Department Archives. Special Field Order no. 15, Mil. Div. of the Mississippi.
Savannah, Georgia, January 16, 1865.
I. The islands from Charleston, south, the abandoned rice fields along the rivers for thirty miles
back from the sea, and the country bordering the St. John's river, Florida, are reserved and set
apart for the settlement of the negroes now made free by the acts of war and the proclamation
of the President of the United States.
II. At Beaufort, Hilton Head, Savannah, Fernandina, St. Augustine, and Jacksonville, the blacks
may remain in. their chosen or accustomed vocations, but on the islands, and in the settlements
hereafter to be established, no white person whatever, unless military officers and soldiers,
detailed for duty, will be permitted to reside; and the sole and exclusive management of affairs
will be left to the freed people themselves, subject only to the United States military authority
and the acts of Congress. By the laws of war and orders of the President of the United States
the negro is free, and must be dealt with as such. He cannot be subjected to conscription or
forced military service, save by the written orders of the highest military authority of the
department, under such regulations as the President or Congress may prescribe. Domestic
servants, blacksmiths, carpenters, and other mechanics, will be free to select their own work
and residence, but the young and able-bodied negroes must be encouraged to enlist as soldiers
in the service of the United States, to contribute their share towards maintaining their own
freedom, and securing their rights as citizens of the United States. . .
III. Whenever three respectable negroes, heads of families, shall desire to settle on lands, and
shall have selected for that purpose an island or a locality clearly defined, within the
[351] limits above designated, the inspector of settlements and plantations will himself, or by
such subordinate officer as he may appoint, give them a license to settle such island or district,
37
and afford them such assistance as he can to enable them to establish a peaceable agricultural
settlement. The three parties named will subdivide the land, under the supervision of the
inspector, among themselves and such others as may choose to settle near them, so that each
family shall have a plot of not more than forty (40) acres of tillable ground, and when it borders
on some water channel, with not more than 800 feet water front, in the possession of which
land the military authorities will afford them protection until such time as they can protect
themselves, or until Congress shall regulate their title. The quartermaster may, on the requisition
of the inspector of settlements and plantations, place at the disposal of the inspector one or
more of the captured steamers, to ply between the settlements and one or more of the
commercial points heretofore named in orders, to afford; the settlers the opportunity to supply
their necessary wants, and to sell the products of their land and labor.
IV. Whenever A negro has enlisted in the military service of the United States he may locate his
family in any one of the settlements at pleasure, and acquire a homestead and all other rights
and privileges of a settler, as though present in person. In like manner negroes may settle their
families and engage on board the gunboats, or in fishing, or in the navigation of the inland
waters, without losing any claim to land or other advantage derived from this system. But no
one, unless an actual settler as above defined, or unless absent on government service, will be
entitled to claim any right to land or property in any settlement by virtue of these orders.
V. In order to carry out this system of settlement, a general officer will be detailed as inspector
of settlements and plantations, whose duty it shall be to visit the settlements, to regulate their
police and general management, and who will furnish personally to each head of a family,
subject to the approval of the President of the United States, a possessory
[352] title in writing, giving as near as possible the description of boundaries, and who shall
adjust all claims or conflicts that may arise under the same, subject to the like approval,
treating such titles altogether as possessory. The same general officer will also be charged with
38
the enlistment and organization of the negro recruits, and protecting their interests while absent
from their settlements, and will be governed by the rules and regulations prescribed by the War
Department for such purposes.
VI. Brigadier General R. Saxton is hereby appointed inspector of settlements and plantations,
and will at once enter on the performance of his duties. No change is intended or desired in the
settlement now on Beaufort island, nor will any rights to property heretofore acquired be
affected thereby.
On December 8, 1863, Lincoln announced his plan of Reconstruction, calling for
amnesty for southerners who took a loyalty oath, recognition of governments in states
where 10% of the 1860 electorate had taken the oath, and emancipation of all slaves.
Lincoln's plan would have left state laws and institutions intact (except those laws
relating to the continued establishment of slavery) and would have left the southern
economic and political structure basically untouched. Unwilling to treat the South so
tenderly, Radical Republicans in Congress refused to seat representatives from the two
states (Arkansas and Louisiana) that fulfilled Lincoln's conditions and proceeded to draft
their own Reconstruction policies. The essence of the Radicals' position was
summarized by Pennsylvania Senator Thaddeus Stevens. The southern states, Stevens
declared,
ought never to be recognized as capable of acting in the Union, or of being
counted as valid States, until the Constitution shall have been so amended as to
make it what its framers intended; and so as to secure perpetual ascendancy to
the party of the Union; and so as to render our republican Government firm and
stable forever. The first of those amendments is to change the basis of
representation among the States from Federal numbers to actual voters. . . .
With the basis unchanged the 83 Southern members, with the Democrats that
will in the best times be elected from the North, will always give a majority in
Congress and in the Electoral College. . . I need not depict the ruin that will
follow. . . .
39
But this is not all we ought to do before inveterate rebels are invited to
participate in our legislation. We have turned, or are about to turn, loose four
million slaves without a hut to shelter them or a cent to their pockets. The
infernal laws of slavery have prevented them from acquiring an education,
understanding the commons laws of contract, or of managing the ordinary
business of life. This Congress is bound to provide for them until they can take
care of themselves. If we do not furnish them with homesteads, and hedge them
around with protective laws; if we leave them to the legislation of their late
masters, we had better have left them in bondage. . . . If we fail in this great duty
now, when we have the power, we shall deserve and receive the execration of
history and of all future ages (Stevens [1865], in Fleming, 1906, I:148-9).
In July of 1864, Congress passed its own more punitive Reconstruction plan -- the
Wade-Davis Bill -- which Lincoln vetoed. This further angered the Radicals, though
they put their animosity aside to ensure Lincoln's reelection in the fall of 1864. With the
election out of the way, the debate resumed and took on greater intensity -- though
Lincoln's increasing stature and his resounding electoral mandate made him a more
formidable adversary. His assassination in April of 1865, improved the Radicals'
prospects. Though Lincoln's successor, Andrew Johnson, pledged to continue the
martyred president's policies, the Radicals rose in open rebellion and, through the Joint
Committee of Fifteen, took control of Reconstruction policies.
Once under the Radicals' control, Congress ratified the Thirteenth Amendment,
abolishing slavery in the United States. A month later, it acted to establish the
Freedmen's Bureau, an agency of the War Department that would take charge of
abandoned lands in the South, would provide for the needs of the freedmen, and would
have the power to try by military commission persons accused to depriving freedmen
of their civil rights. President Johnson vetoed the bill, asserting that Congress had no
power to pass legislation affecting unrepresented states and that the provisions for
military trials were unconstitutional. Congress overrode Johnson's veto -- and then
went on to pass an act which granted to the freedmen full civil rights. Johnson also
vetoed this bill, which he condemned as an unwarranted invasion of states' rights.
40
Again, his veto was overridden. Shortly thereafter, Congress drafted the Fourteenth
Amendment, which extended all the rights guaranteed by the federal Constitution to
the states. Finally, at the end of June 1866, the Joint Committee of Fifteen issued a
report which recommended that the southern states be denied representation in
Congress and that Congress, rather than the Executive Branch, retain control of the
Reconstruction process.
President Johnson hoped that these actions would be repudiated in the congressional
elections slated for the fall of 1866 -- and set out to organize a new political party -- the
National Union Party -- which would bring together moderates from both Republican
and Democratic folds. Johnson's plans were dashed by energetic Radical propaganda
activities which focused public attention on violence and oppression against freed slaves
(especially the notorious Black Laws which virtually reinstituted slavery), as well as
bloody race riots in New Orleans and Memphis. The National Union effort failed and
the Radicals succeeded in capturing two-thirds of the membership of both houses of
Congress. When the new Congress convened in March of 1867, it proceeded to give
Reconstruction its final shape: the First Reconstruction Act, again passed over Johnson's
veto, divided the South into five military districts and placed the region under martial
law. To achieve restoration, the Southern states would have to call new constitutional
conventions, elected by universal manhood suffrage, which were to establish new state
governments which guaranteed the rights of freedmen and ratified the Fourteenth
Amendment. Ex-Confederates were disqualified from voting and Congress reserved
to itself the power to review cases, seat representatives, and end military rule.
The Radicals had been trying to establish a "Bureau of Emancipation" since early in
1863 . Despite intense lobbying from the freedmen's aid associations, the first bill died
in committee. Reintroduced in December of 1863, the revised bill proposed a bureau to
41
be located in the War Department and entrusted with responsibilities for "all questions
concerning persons of African descent and all persons who by proclamation, law, or by
military order, had, or should, become entitled to their freedom" (Pierce, 1904, 35). The
bureau would be authorized to "make all needful rules for the general superintendence
and treatment of such persons," ensure that their rights be "determined and
maintained," and regulate the cultivation of abandoned and confiscated lands. The bill
aroused intense opposition from northern Democrats, who argued that the bureau
would "open up a vast field for corruption, tyranny, greed, and abuse" and (with the
Pierce Veto doubtless in mind) was "a measure too sweeping and revolutionary for a
government of limited and express powers" (38). After squeaking through the House,
the bill went to the Senate where Sumner and his allies pushed to have the bureau
attached to the Treasury Department. Though the proposal passed by a resounding
majority, it proved impossible to reconcile the Senate and House versions and, in July
of 1864, the matter was postponed until the next session of Congress. The bill was not
taken up again until December, when it was referred to a conference committee. The
committee did not issue its report until February of 1865.
The Freedmen's Bureau (or, as it was officially known, the Bureau of Freedmen,
Refugees, and Abandoned Lands) was finally established in March of 1865. Envisaged
as a temporary measure -- the Bureau was to exist for but a single year -- its existence
was ultimately extended through 1868 -- and its educational efforts continued until 1872.
The Bureau's responsibilities were to include distribution rations and medical supplies,
establishing schools and aiding benevolent societies in setting up schools and churches,
administering confiscated lands, and levying justice in all cases concerning freedmen.
The legislation authorizing the creation of the Bureau constituted a remarkable
blueprint for public-private cooperation: the government proposed to economically
empower the freedmen by redistributing to them confiscated lands; using revenues
42
derived from these lands, the Bureau was to make available buildings, transportation,
and protection to the private agencies to whom would be entrusted the task of
educating the freedmen. In effect, the act institutionalized the paradigm developed in
the Sea Islands.
SECOND FREEMEN'S BUREAU ACT
Acts and Resolutions, 39th Congress, 1st Session
Be it enacted. . . That the act to establish a Bureau for the relief of Freedmen and Refugees,
approved March third, eighteen hundred sixty-five, shall continue in force for the term of two
years from and after the passage of this act.
Sec. 2. . . .The supervision and care of said bureau shall extent to all loyal refugees and
freedmen, so far as the same may be necessary to enable them as speedily as practicable to
become self-supporting citizens of the United States, and to aid them in making the freedom
conferred by the proclamation of the Commander-in-Chief, by emancipation under the laws of
the States, and by constitutional amendment, available to them and beneficial to the Republic. .
..
Sec. 5 . . .The second section of the act to which this is an amendment shall be deemed to
authorize the Secretary of War to issue such medical stores or other supplies and transportation
and afford such medical or other aid as may be needful for the purposed named in said section:
Provided, that no person shall be deemed "destitute," "suffering," or "dependent upon the
Government for support," within the meaning of this act, who is able to find employment, and
could, by proper industry and exertion, avoid such destitution, suffering, or dependency. . . .
Sec. 12. . . .The Commissioner shall have power to seize, hold, use, lease, or sell all buildings,
and tenements, and any lands appertaining to the same, or otherwise, formerly held under color
or title by the late so-called Confederate States, and not heretofore disposed of by the United
43
States, and any buildings or lands held in trust for the same by any persons or persons, and to
use the same or appropriate the proceeds derived therefrom to the education of the freed
people; and whenever the bureau shall cease to exist, such of said so-called Confederate States
as shall have made provision for the education of their citizens without distinction of color shall
receive the sum remaining unexpended of such sales or rentals, which shall be distributed among
said States for educational purposes in proportion to their population.
Sec. 13. . . .The Commissioner of this bureau shall at all times co-operate with private
benevolent associations of citizens in aid of freedmen, and with agents and teachers, duly
accredited and appointed by them, and shall hire or provide by leave, buildings for purposes of
education whenever such associations shall, without cost to the Government, provide suitable
teachers and means of instruction; and he shall furnish such protection as may be required for
the safe conduct of such schools. . . .
Congress placed the Freedmen's Bureau under the charge of General Oliver O.
Howard. Unlike political generals like Fremont, Butler, and Hunter, Howard was an
army "regular" -- a professional military man. A native of Maine, Howard had attended
Bowdoin College and graduated from West Point in 1854. Howard saw service on
virtually every front during the war, losing an arm at the Battle of Fair Oaks, while
serving under General Sherman. Although intensely religious, Howard had not started
out his war service as an abolitionist. However, experiences in the field -- including
most importantly his witnessing first-hand the desperate conditions facing the
freedmen during Sherman's march to the sea -- led him to favor more and more the
Radicals' viewpoints.
Early in May of 1865, Howard was summoned from the field (he was still serving
under Sherman in the Army of Tennessee) to report to the Secretary of War, Edwin M.
44
Stanton. Stanton, now the Radicals' point man in the Cabinet since Treasury Secretary
Chase's appointment to the Supreme Court, offered Howard the post of Commissioner
of the Freedmen's Bureau.
On the morning of May 12th, I returned to Mr. Stanton and said, "I have
concluded to accept the duty you offer me." He briefly expressed his satisfaction
and send for the papers, chiefly letters from correspondents, widely separated,
and reports, official and unofficial, touching upon matters which pertained to
refugees and freedmen. The clerk in charge brought in a large, oblong, bushel
basket heaped with letters and documents. Mr. Stanton, with both hands
holding the handles at each end, took the basket and extended it to me and with
a smile said: "Here, general, here's your Bureau!" (Howard, 1907, II: 208).
Thus Howard took command of a completely disorganized effort that would deal
with the affairs of four million people over 500,000 square miles of territory and
administering nearly a million acres of abandoned and confiscated property.
Congratulating -- and cautioning -- him, Howard's old commander, General Sherman,
would write, "I fear you have Hercules' task. God has limited the power of man, and
though in the kindness of your heart you would alleviate all the ills of humanity, it is
not in your power to fulfill one tenth part of the expectation of those who formed the
Bureau. . . . It is simply impracticable. Yet you can and will do all the one good man
may, and that is all you are called on as a man and a Christian can do. . . (Howard, 20910).
As he assembled his staff and surveyed the task, Howard was awed by its scope and
scale. The daunting political obstacles aside, he found that in its relief efforts alone, the
military was issuing some 144,000 rations a day to freedmen and refugees throughout
the country. Using his powers to requisition assistants from throughout the armed
forces, he had soon put together a multidivisional operation (Records, Land, Financial
Affairs, Medical, Commissary Supplies, Education) which employed more than 2,000
staffers. Fortunately, Howard was able to count on the help of fellow officers like
45
Rufus Saxon, who had been closely involved with the Port Royal Experiment, and John
Eaton, who had administered freedmen's affairs for Grant -- as well as the financial and
political resources of the benevolent societies and their hundreds of volunteers, many
of whom had been actively working in the South since 1862.
Placing Freedmen's affairs under the control of a single consolidated bureau altered
the task facing the thirty or so private organizations working with freedmen and
refugees. The provisions of the statute creating the Bureau gave their activities a quasiofficial status and, as they sought to avail themselves of the government's offer of
financial and other forms of aid, generated pressures for them to operate more
efficiently and effectively.
GENERAL HOWARD ON THE BENEVOLENT SOCIETIES
May 19, 1865
. . .May 18, 1865, the Rev. Lyman Abbott, then a vigorous young minister, paid a visit to the
new Bureau. He came to Washington as a delegate from New York to speak in behalf of several
volunteer freedmen's societies. There had already been some effort among them to consolidate.
I at once favored a plan for a general union of forces, which would evidently make them both
more effective and more economical in administration.
Mr. Abbott, agreeing with this view, promised to do all in his power to bring about such a
union. As he was greatly interested in the work of education among the freedmen, I consulted
him with reference to the first important circular issues from headquarters May 19, 1865. It
announced well-defined principles of action. Mr. Abbott's aid and advice have ever since been
gratefully remembered. The following words met his special approval: "I invite, therefore, the
continuance and cooperation of such societies. I trust they will be generously supported by the
people, and I request them to send me their names, list of their principal officers, and a brief
46
statement of their present work. . . . The educational and moral condition of these (the freed)
people will not be forgotten. The utmost facility will be afforded to benevolent and religious
organizations and State authorities in the maintenance of good schools for refugees and
freedmen until a system of free schools can be supported by the recognized local governments.
Meanwhile, whenever schools are broken up by any authorized agent of the Government, it is
requested that the fact and attendant circumstances be reported to this Bureau.
"Let me repeat, that in all this work it is not my [270] purpose to supersede the benevolent
agencies already engaged in it, but to systematize and facilitate them."
The next step after public announcement was to introduce in the field some practical
systematic arrangement. So much overlapping and interference one with another were found
among the workers that I hastened to appoint a school superintendent for each State. He was
generally a commissioned officer detailed from the army and placed under the direct authority
of the State assistant commissioner of the Bureau. The majority of the schools throughout the
South were elementary. They were more flourishing in those localities which had been for six
months or more within the lines of our armies. After peace many Government schools were
added to those of the benevolent societies, being brought into existence by Bureau officials.
These were self-supporting from the start. The educational work was in every way helped by
the extraordinary ardor of the pupils and the enthusiasm of the teachers, fed by the societies
behind them, who at this time voiced the generous devotion of benevolent people everywhere. . .
. [271] The entire number of pupils in the schools for freedmen at the close of 1865 in the States
that had been in insurrection, adding Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland, and the District of
Columbia, amounted to 90,589; teachers 1,314, and schools 740. . . . The Bureau gave
transportation to teachers from their homes to their field and back during necessary vacations.
It also carried all their books and furniture, and to a considerable extent while the abandoned
property remained available, provided buildings for the dwelling places of teachers and for the
schools themselves. I came early to the conclusion that our school work was best promoted by
47
placing one dollar of public money by the side of one of voluntary contribution. The Bureau
gave to any benevolent society in that proportion. The society which undertook the most in that
manner received the most."
48
As is so often the case with efforts to rationalize voluntary organizations, ideas that
looked good on paper proved to be difficult to achieve in practice. Issues of personality
and organizational turf aside, both sectarian and sectional differences proved especially
difficult to overcome. Some groups, especially those which viewed their educational
initiatives as serving evangelical goals, were reluctant to cooperate with less religiously
committed organizations. Western organizations feared domination by eastern ones.
These tensions were reflected in the freemen's societies publications.
Early in 1865, two of the major freedmen's societies, the New York National
Freedmen's Relief Association and the American Union Commission, together with
elements from New York's Women's Center Relief Association, a branch of the United
States Sanitary Commission, consolidated themselves as the American Freedmen's and
Union Commission (New York National Freedmen's Relief Commission, 1866, 14).
This brought together the eastern elite liberal protestant -- primarily Unitarian and
Congregationalist -- elements of the freedmen's advocates who had closely allied
themselves with General Howard's push for rationalization of the benevolent societies'
efforts. (It was led by such men as Yale professor Leonard Bacon, the "pope" of New
England Congregationalism, Francis G. Shaw, New York Unitarian philanthropist and
reformer -- and father of Union martyr Robert Gould Shaw and charity organization
leader Josephine Shaw Lowell --, and Bostonian Edward H. Hooper, a lawyer and
financier who would soon be elected Treasurer of Harvard).
By the spring of 1866, they were pushing to expand the consolidation effort and
called a meeting to convene in Cleveland to work for "the more perfect and satisfactory
organization and adjustment of the work in the Western States" (American Freedman,
1866a, 4).
49
From The American Freedman, Vol. I, No. 3 (June 1866)
THE CLEVELAND MEETING.
THE resignation of Bishop Simpson (owing to the pressure of his other duties) rendered
necessary a meeting of the Commission to elect a president in his place. At the same time, it
was desirable to secure a conference of delegates from the various undenominational societies
engaged in the work of education and relief in the South. The fundamental principle of our
organization, no distinction of caste or color, had been fully discussed in the East at meetings
called for that purpose. No such discussions had taken place west of the mountains. Our
principles and purposes were not well understood by our co-laborers there. And while all the
Eastern societies had formally ratified our constitution, and several of the Western societies had
done so, several of the western branches of the late Freedmen's Aid Commission declined, or at
least delayed to do so. Believing that a mutual conference between the East and the West was
all that was necessary to remove the misunderstanding which had arisen, and to secure the
hearty and unanimous co-operation of the East and the West in our common work, the
Executive Committee issued a call for a meeting of this Commission at the City of Cleveland on
the 16th of May, to which also were invited representative and undenominational societies.
THE OBJECT OF THE MEETING
The object of this meeting is set forth in the following resolution:
Resolved, That the General Secretary be directed to call a meeting of the Commission in the
city of Cleveland at such time as may be agreed upon by correspondence with the branch at
that place; that he incorporate in the call a notice that a President will be elected in place of
Bishop Simpson, resigned, and that such amendments to the Constitution may be submitted as
are necessary for the more perfect and satisfactory organization and adjustment of the work in
the Western States; and that he invite all the Societies hitherto acting as auxiliary to either the
Commission to send delegates to confer with the Commission upon the general interests of the
work and the best methods of its prosecution. . . .
50
The Business Committee, through Rev. E.H. Canfield, D.D., made a report, in part as
follows:
Resolved, That all the delegates to the meeting, and other friends of the cause, be invited to sit
as corresponding members, and take part in its deliberations.
Resolved, That the Chairman of this Committee be requested to submit to this meeting such
facts in regard to the history of the Commission as may be instructive and needful to their
guidance.
Resolved, That a Committee be appointed to enquire into the best method of promoting the
unity and efficiency of all the organizations in the United States for the benefit of the freedmen.
The first and second resolutions were unanimously adopted.
Under the second resolution, J.M. McKim, Corresponding Secretary of the Freedmen's and
Union Commission, gave the following report of which we copy from the Cleveland Leader:
HISTORY OF THE FREEDMEN'S AND UNION COMMISSION.
He said this movement originally grew out of capture of Port Royal, some four years ago. It
was seen that provision must be made for the care of the poor blacks who came into our hands,
and small societies were created to effect this purpose. The first was at New York, the second
at Boston -- called the New England Educational Commission -- and the third at Philadelphia,
called the Port Royal Society. Afterwards, as Grant gave us victories in the West, Freedmen's
societies sprang up in Chicago, Cincinnati, and the West; and these became strong bodies. Then
the necessity of union between these different societies became apparent, and those of Boston,
New York, Philadelphia, Cincinnati, Chicago, and elsewhere were partially united, with a
general headquarters at Washington. This quasi union was found to be unsatisfactory, and a
genuine union anxiously desired. Various informal propositions were made, and finally it was
deterred to organize a strong National Association. Gentlemen from the West said they would
unite with us of the East, and we were glad to undertake the project of a strong, bona fide
51
national organization. We of the East held preliminary meetings, and created the "American
Freedmen's Aid Union," including all local branches from Boston west to Pittsburgh, and south
to Washington. This movement was tolerably successful, yet we had not gained what we
wanted -- A REALLY NATIONAL COMMISSION. Accordingly, we had conference and
correspondence with men from all parts of the country, and just as we were going to bring the
work to a close, we were requested not to go on until the West should be more fully consulted.
We awaited the arrival of our friends from the West, and then organized the "American
Freedmen's Aid Commission." This was an excellent movement, but we soon felt it was not
enough. It was exclusively, a Freedmen's Commission; on its face devoted to a class. We were
at work on expediency, and not on principle -- that is, the highest principle. We wanted to
spread our arms wider, to occupy, broader ground.
At this time there was also in existence another institution, the "American Union
Commission." It was not so well arranged as ours, and did not work so well; but it had a good
basis, and was doing something. At a meeting of our Commission (attended by Bishop
Simpson, Judge Bond, Mr. Beecher, Dr. Thompson, Generals Fisk and Swayne) it was asked,
Why, have two organizations for the same purpose -- why such complex and multiplied
machinery? It was answered, there were no good reasons for this, if we could possibly unite our
forces. The proposition for a union was referred to a committee, who reported in its favor both
as to sentiment and practicability. At last a meeting was held to bring about our object. We
met opposition, and had a hard struggle. Mr. Garrison dissented from our view. He said the
"Union Commission" was formed for the Southern whites, and his first duty was to the
freedmen. He presented several arguments against the fusion; but we said, granted that the
colored men have the first claim upon us, we ought also to remember all necessitous people
without regard to race or color. We ought not to have a commission founded on class in name or
theory. Thus we debated the question, until from all our struggle came out a hearty
endorsement of the plan of union, and on the 31st of January the consolidation was effected,
52
and the nuptials triumphantly celebrated. This established the "American Freedmen's and
Union Commission."
Shortly afterward, we learned with some surprise and very deep regret that some of our
friends in the West were not prepared to cooperate with our new society. This being the case,
we have called this meeting in a spirit of conciliation and Christian sympathy, for a free and
frank interchange of sentiment. Our Commission is strong, and we of the East are fully united
in its support. We have the approval of Chief-Justice Chase, of Senators and Representatives,
of business men and scholars, of the great and good everywhere in the East, and we ardently
desire the co-operation of and fraternity of all our Western co-laborers in the great cause.
Mr. McKim then traced the proceedings of the new Commission and its Executive Committee
from the 31st of January to the present time, fully explaining, its constitution and transactions.
Its corner stone is this declaration:
"This Commission is constituted to aid and co-operate with the people of the South, without
distinction of race or color, in the improvement of their condition upon the basis of industry,
freedom, education, and Christian morality. No schools or supply depots shall be maintained
from the benefits of which any shall be excluded because of their color.
DISCUSSION.
The third resolution was then taken up. Its author, Dr. Peck, asked for a full expression
upon it, in order to lay the groundwork for harmonious action.
In accordance with this request, a lengthy discussion ensued. . . . This discussion elicited
some difference of opinion on minor points, but a substantial agreement in principle and
purpose, and an earnest desire to waive all minor difficulties and unite in a broad, liberal, and
Christian policy of benevolence. A few observations by Dr. Burroughs toward the close of the
53
meeting were received with hearty and unanimous approbation. He said he felt most deeply
against our having two organizations for the same purpose. If this goes on, we shall soon have
more conflicting interests. We shall soon have denominational projects brought out. Our
several religious constituencies are up and doing, and we must move so as, if possible, to
concentrate all these activities -- to merge all our co-laborers in one grand organization. We
must subordinate all personal preferences and prejudices to the main purpose, and, if
necessary, let us stay here a week to accomplish our benevolent object.
The third resolution was then adopted, and the following committee announced to
enquire into the best method of promoting the unity, harmony, and efficiency of all the
organizations in the United States for the benefit of the freedmen. . . .
Despite the liberal protestants' pleas for cooperation between the freedmen's
societies and for a Christian but unsectarian emphasis in their education and relief
efforts, the denominationally tied associations -- the American Missionary Association,
the Methodists' Freedmen's Aid Society, the Baptists' Home Mission Society, and the
Quakers' Friends' Association for the Aid and Elevation of the Freedman -- resisted
consolidation efforts. As one Methodist minister put it, "Methodist hands should have
handled Methodist funds, and been appropriated to pay Methodist teachers, to found
Methodist schools, and carry on a work for which the denomination should have due
credit" (quoted in Swint, 1967, 13). This conflict between religious and secular (or
nonsectarian) philanthropy both paralleled the wartime conflicts between the United
States Sanitary Commission and the United States Christian Commission and
foreshadowed the divergence of philanthropic orientations that would occur in a more
pronounced fashion in the last years of the nineteenth century.
54
From The American Freedmen I: 6 (September 1866), 94-6.
EDUCATION AND RELIGION
We desire for the present consideration of the public, and especially of Christian
philanthropists, the question: What method will best promote the cause of popular education
and pure religion in the South? The necessity of both is almost universally recognized. Neither
can take the place of the other. Education unsanctified by religion issues in infidelity and
anarchy. Religion unenlightened by education begets superstition and despotism. The schoolhouse without the church produces China; the church without the school-house, Italy; the church
and the school-house, Republican America.
How to combine these two is an important problem. There are two possible solution. The
religious denominations may undertake the double work. They may plant the parochial school
by the side of the church; they may teach at once the rules of arithmetic and the lessons of the
catechism, the laws of grammar and the doctrines of theology. Such a system give parochial
schools. On the other hand, the various religious denominations may assume as their peculiar
province the work of religious instruction. To that they may confine themselves, while the whole
community unites in a common effort for the education of the masses, not only in secular
knowledge, but in those precepts of morality and teachings of Christian religion in which all
agree. This system is the common-school. It is the almost universal system of Protestant
Republicanism. . . .
[95] When Emancipation first rendered dependent upon us so many sufferers, all Christians
made haste to their assistance, and ecclesiastical societies vied with unsectarian associations in
the work of physical relief and secular education. To the honor of the church be it said that no
denomination was deaf to the call of humanity and God. These special and localized efforts
have done much for the relief and education of the Freedman. But now, in order to perpetuate
the results already attained, to secure the greatest amount of good with the least expenditure in
55
the future, to avoid duplication of charities and rivalries of societies, and, above all, to establish
a permanent self-sustaining and growing system of popular education, modelled upon the
patterns afforded by past experience, a more perfect organization and a more systematic [96]
division of labor are required; and especially is it necessary that we should draw with some
precision the lines which separate the work of the ecclesiastical from that of the philanthropic
associations, and determine whether acting through denominational agencies we will content
ourselves with such parochial schools as they may establish, or whether, assigning to them that
more distinctly missionary work which is quite sufficient to absorb all their energies, we will
combine in one national and unsectarian organization for the establishment in the Southern
States of that common-school system which is the glory and safety of our country. Already the
various undenominational Freedmen's societies have united to form such an organization, in the
American Freedman's Union Commission, a commission which embraces representatives of all
denominations, includes constituent societies in all parts of the North, and during the past year
has sustained over seven hundred teachers, and instructed over forty thousand pupils.
Recognizing no distinctions of caste or color, it devotes its energies mainly to this one work, the
promotion of popular education in the South.
The education of the South, especially of the Freedmen, is a truly religious work; none the
less so because it is undenominational. Cousin rightly says, "The less we desire our schools to
be ecclesiastical, the more they ought to be Christian." Called to this work not only by the
claims of country and of humanity, but also by the voice of God, recognizing it as His work,
entering upon it in humble trust on Him, aiming by it to render the subjects of our education
better fitted to be not only citizens of the Republic but children of our Father in heaven, we
desire the more that our schools may be truly Christian because they are unecclesiastical. For
this purpose we aim to commission only teachers possessing the spirit of true religion, by which
we do not mean persons of any particular doctrinal views, but such as are attracted to the
work, not by curiosity, or love of adventure, or its compensation, but by a genuine spirit of love
56
for God and man; for this purpose our schools are opened with such general religious exercises
as our experience in the North proves it practicable for all Christians to unite in; for this
purpose in all the schools instruction is afforded in the fundamental duties of the Christian
religion as inculcated in the command, "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and
soul and strength, and thy neighbor as thyself;" no less for this purpose do we jealously
maintain their unsectarian character, not allowing the peculiar tenets of any particular
denomination to be taught in the schools.
While we thus aim to establish a school system which, strictly unecclesiastical and yet
genuinely Christian, shall afford a sure foundation for sound morality and pure religion, we
rejoice in all the good which the churches are doing by the inculcation of more specific religious
truth, for the redemption of the suffering, down-trodden, and degraded in the South. We
recognize the importance of their work. Individually participating in their labors in our
respective churches, we are always ready as a commission to co-operate with them in all
legitimate ways. We are not and can not be their rivals. We are their coadjutors in a common
cause. For every faithful church promotes the cause of popular education; and popular
education is the ally of the Christian church.
As reviving industry renders less imperative the demands for physical relief, the cause of
education increases in relative importance, and the establishment of common schools open to all
classes in all the Southern States becomes our most important work. The want is pressing, the
necessity urgent, the work gigantic, the difficulties many. Only a united effort can accomplish a
task so difficult. We ask, then, the careful attention of friends of religion and education to the
distinction which we have in this paper attempted to set forth, and cordially invite all to unite
with us in one common effort to secure this great end -- the establishment throughout the
Republic, upon permanent foundations, of COMMON SCHOOLS for the education of all
without distinction of sect, caste, or color.
57
On behalf of the American Freedman's Union Commission.
REV. LYMAN ABBOT,
REV. E.H. CANFIELD, D.D.
REV. O.B. FROTHINGHAM,
FRANCIS R. COPE
NATHAN BISHOP, LL.D.,
Special Committee
58
Reasoned argument having failed, the "unsectarian" Freedmen's Union Commission
began attacking the religious societies, suggesting that their efforts were actually
destructive to the overall relief effort, discouraging the establishment of common
schools and stimulating the hostility of southern whites -- most of whom, as this
anonymous correspondent in The American Freedman pointed out, were already
practicing Christians.
From the American Freedman, I:9 (December 1866), 130.
A BONE OF CONTENTION
[The following article is from the pen of an earnest Christian and an active and successful
teacher in the South. We commend it to the attention of our readers because it discusses an old
question from a new standpoint, the practical view of a Southern worker.--ED. AMERICAN
FREEDMAN.]
WHATEVER may be the political views of Christian men at the North, whether Radical or
Conservative, in one thing they should agree, namely: That the influence of such men and
institutions from our section should be exerted in the direction of peace and reconciliation; so
far as this can be done without the sacrifice of principle.
The education of the freedmen, following in the wake of the army, was the first introduction
of well-organized Yankee good will to the people of the South. The first associations formed
were most of them secular rather than religious; and so far as the observation of the writer has
extended such teachers were commissioned by these organizations, where they attended strictly
to the duties of their calling, were, as a general thing, unmolested. Sympathy they had no right
to expect, indifference was toleration, and toleration permitted their work to thrive and
prosper.
59
Notwithstanding the almost entire withdrawal of the army, most of their school stations are
still occupied, and outrages upon teachers are by no means of common occurrence.
Within a few months, a "change of base" has taken place among some of the friends of this
cause, and we find churches and sects forming associations to establish parochial schools in
connection with their own peculiar religious organizations.
In the practical carrying out of their plans, they aim to "extend the borders of their church" by
connecting with it all making the same profession, and to add wherever practicable a
denominational school to each distinct church or organization.
With reference to the introduction of Northern clergymen to religious labor at the South, it is
notorious that nearly all the white population professing Christianity have since the war
returned to their old organizations.
There is a population of "poor whites" in the mountains, and scattered up and down through
the country, who need and should have from every source religious aid, but real "church
extension" in the Southern States must find most of its material among the freedmen.
Nearly all the members of the colored churches have hitherto been counted in membership
with the larger denominations of the South. To connect individual churches with other
associations holding the same doctrine and discipline, and once working in harmony, is to keep
alive a sectarian feud, which can not but result injuriously to the cause of religion and of a
united country.
60
Its tendency to increase the sectarian feeling which the experience of all teachers among the
freedmen shows to be already exceedingly strong; in some localities almost preventing the
harmony of action with reference to the support of the poor, the care of the sick, etc.
Its tendency to widen yet further the breach between the late owner, the present employer of
the colored man, and himself, and thus it may add another drop to the cup of bitterness of
which the latter in his transition state has been so often compelled to drink.
The permanent occupation of the pulpits of the colored churches by a white clergy tends to
perpetuate the slave education of the negro, by continuing his dependence upon the brains of
the Anglo-Saxon for guidance.
Many of the places of worship occupied by freedmen at the South are held in law by
Southern conferences and associations. Will not the new connection be likely to provoke
annoyance in this direction of a very trying character?
Such schools as are organized in connection with this movement will doubtless be made so
far as they can be with propriety, self-supporting. Let us suppose that in the course of a few
years they be opened all over a single State, and the question of a system of free schools come
before the legislature of that State. If such schools (the parochial) are generally attended and
supported by the freed-people, will not the opponents of a free-school bill have the vantage
ground? Will not even the societies maintaining such be passively opposed?
Doubtless the schools for freedmen thus established will be of good character, and the
children will make progress in learning; but will not institutions under such auspices be more
likely to excite prejudice against the instructions of the blacks than the simple unsectarian
schools of the secular associations?
61
Toward the latter in many places a better feeling exists than formerly. . . .
The work of the secular associations has been of such character as not to come in
competition with other organizations [in the] South. Conducting free schools as a general rule, it
has introduced some capital in a small way, and if ever obliged to retire before religious
propagation it will have the honor of pioneer efforts and disinterested motives.
Despite these efforts, the consolidation effort ultimately failed. The American
Missionary Society and the Baptist, Methodist, and Quaker organizations had held aloof
from the 1865 merger of the American Freedmen's Aid Association and the American
Freedmen's Union Commission -- the two major "unsectarian" societies. By the spring
of 1867, the western branches of the American Freedmen's Union Commission, which
had been drawn back into the fold at the Cleveland meeting a year earlier, again
withdrew -- primarily over the question of parochial versus free schools. Though all
these groups still worked with the Freedmen's Bureau in the field, the resulting
fragmentation and duplication of efforts not only impaired the effectiveness of
educational and relief work, but, more seriously, competing fund-raising efforts tended
to delegitimate the whole cause in the eyes of donors. As the private relief movement
broke up, contributions to all the associations began to drop off. Even such magnificent
gestures as the establishment of the Peabody Fund -- the largest charitable donation of
the period -- failed to stem the decline broad support.
The Peabody Educational Fund, a charitable trust established by international banker
George Peabody in 1867, was notable not only for its size -- in excess of two million
dollars -- but also for its unique form. Rather than being a gift to an already operating
eleemosynary organization or an endowment on which a new operating entity would
62
be based, it was a free-standing trust whose purpose was to give support -- at the
discretion of its trustees -- to other organizations. As such, it was the first grant-making
foundation in the United States. A similar fund, the Slater Fund, would be set up by
Connecticut industrialist John F. Slater in 1882. Like Peabody, Slater specified that his
gift should be used for "Christian education" in the sense in which the Freedmen's
Union used the term: "when asked the precise meaning of the term. . . ," he replied, "in
the sense that the common school teaching of Massachusetts and Connecticut was
Christian education. That it is leavened with a predominant and salutary Christian
influence" (quoted in Bolton, 1896, 337).
Although the Freedmen's Union Commission was quick to claim kinship to
Peabody's effort, the Fund in fact with remarkable --and perhaps understandable -independence from both the freedmen's societies and the Freedmen's Bureau. None of
its trustees had abolitionist connections, nor were any involved with the societies. The
Fund conducted its own investigations of the South's educational needs and, though
conceding the need for educating blacks, emphasized the importance of serving the
needs of the white population.
From The American Freedman I:12 (March 1867), 178.
GO AND DO LIKEWISE
MR. PEABODY'S munificent gift is the theme of universal comment and admiration. It
certainly is unrivalled in the history of christian beneficence. At the close of a long a terrible
war, a citizen of the Union, whose loyalty is above suspicion, gives a million of dollars in
money, and a further gift of stocks whose value it is perhaps difficult to estimate, to educate
the very people who had united to destroy the land he loved. Surely this is obedience to
63
Christ's law of low: "But I say unto your, love your enemies; bless them that curse you, do good
to them that hate you."
For this gift is not an expression of accord with Southern ideas and institutions. On the
contrary it is the effort of a Christian philanthropist on a grand scale, to combat and overcome
those ideas by the power of love; by supplanting them by a true education.
By this gift Mr. Peabody declares his faith in the power of right principles, and by an act
which speaks louder than words, his belief that it only needs that the Southern people should
receive universal education, to imbibe those principles of Republicanism which necessarily
accompany it.
If the munificence of this benefaction has deservedly attracted public attention, the
principles upon which it is to be administered, are no less worthy of note, It is in the interest of
no sect or party. Northerner and Southerner, united in one board for its administration. Thus
the co-operation of the Southern people is invited by the very conditions of the trust created. It
is in the interest of no denomination. While it is given in a genuinely Christian spirit, and as a
means of promoting the cause of true religion, it is administered by no sect, and is not to be
made, cannot be made, the means of building up any particular denomination. It is in the
interest of no race. Without words Mr. Peabody has affixed the seal of his own condemnation
on the cant, "This is a white man's government." Education is like the Gospel, for all God's
children, and the benefits of this trust fund, are by the terms of its creation to be shared by all
classes, without distinction of cast[e] or color.
In and by this gift Mr. Peabody does but give expression to the almost universal sentiment in
the North; to its absolutely universal Christian sentiment. Schemes of revenge find no favor
with us. Plans and policies of sweeping confiscation are condemned. We demand guarantees
64
for the future, but not vengeance for the past. On the contrary it is our sincere desire to do what
in us lies, to give help and succor to the suffering South. This city [New York] alone has recently
raised $30,000, and the subscription is far from complete, to send bread to the famine-stricken.
The appeal of the Southern Relief Commission, signed by men never suspected of Southern
sympathies, in the political sense, lies before us as we write. And to this appeal the Northern
heart and the Northern pocket generously respond. In the country at large, we have raised and
distributed through this commission during the years 1865-'6, nearly a million of dollars in the
work of relief and education. This money is contributed upon the conditions and administered
upon the principles which characterize Mr. Peabody's donation. It is n the interest of no sect or
party. The co-operation of the Southern people is cordially invited and gradually obtained. It
is in the interest of the Christian religion, and so of all Churches, but in that of no particular
denomination. Its benefits are for all, of whatever class and race, who will accept them. Mr.
Peabody is but one of a great army of philanthropists whose aims are the same, though of
necessity their gifts are less than his.
Reader, if you commend the spirit and character of Mr. Peabody's gift, go and do likewise.
Give according the Lord hath prospered you. Follow the example you admire. Five hundred
dollars will support a teacher. Send one. Ten will give a year's schooling to a single pupil.-How many will you take at the price? And remember, that however men estimate gifts, God
measures them not by their absolute magnitude, but by the spirit which actuates them. You may
rival in divine contemplation, even the munificence of Mr. Peabody.
65
As the private societies did battle with one another, the efforts of the Freedmen's
Bureau itself began to falter. Its activities stimulated growing opposition throughout
the South: teachers were beaten and schools were burned. The continuing battle
between President Johnson and Congress took its toll of the Bureau's most competent
officers. The President, Howard stated, "was very anxious to be rid of every prominent
officer who was reported to have been long the freedmen's friend" (Howard, 1907, II:
283). At the same time, Johnson launched a well-publicized investigation of the Bureau
intended to discredit it. "The inspectors have pursued an extraordinary course,"
Howard complained. "They took as clerks several newspaper reporters, who gave to
the press the substance of their reports, and sometimes the reports themselves" (II:
298). Although Congress supported the Bureau's work, appropriating $7 million in
1866, Howard found it increasingly difficult on the one hand to protect its agents and
facilities from violence by southern vigilantes and, on the other, from internal
corruption.
Despite these problems, Congress extended the life of the Bureau, which had been
slated to cease operations in 1868. However, it decided limit its activities, authorizing
the Secretary of War to curtail its judicial, property management, and relief operations
in states which had been restored to constitutional relations in the union (as of 1868,
these included Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, North Carolina, and
South Carolina; by 1870, these would be joined by Mississippi, Texas, and Virginia).
Decisions about the continuance of the Bureau's educational work, its hospitals and
orphanages, and its claims division (which provided benefits for black veterans) were to
be left to the discretion of Congress.
Gradually, the Bureau's functions were curtailed
or transferred to other agencies -- and it formally ceased to exist at the end of June 1872.
66
Certainly education was the Bureau's most enduring contribution to Reconstruction.
Although it advocated the establishment of publicly-supported free schools, its
dependence on northern philanthropic and voluntary organizations -- as well as the
hostility with which southerners viewed the agency -- led to the establishment of some
two dozen privately supported high and normal (teacher training) schools and colleges.
These included the National Theological Institute, Howard University, St. Martin's
School, and Miss M.R. Mann's School, in the District of Columbia; Richmond Normal
and High School and the Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute in Virginia; St.
Augustine's Normal School and Biddle Memorial Institute in North Carolina; South
Carolina High and Normal Schools in South Carolina; Atlanta University in Georgia;
Alabama High and Normal Schools in Alabama; Wesleyan College, Fiske University,
Roberts College, and Maysville College, in Tennessee; Berea College in Kentucky;
Wilberforce University in Ohio; Quindaro High School in Kansas; Storer College in
West Virginia; St. Bridget's Parochial School, Lincoln University, Avery College, and the
Institute for Colored Youth, in Pennsylvania (Pierce, 1904, 78). Ironically, the Peabody
Fund, though a private endowment, proved to be a more important force in the
establishment of public education in the South -- in part because the Fund's trustees
included influential southerners, in part because it avoided involvement with the
benevolent societies and the Freedmen's Bureau.
The role of the Bureau in the establishment of so many private educational
institutions in the South serves to highlight the importance of its work as part of a
unique and unprecedented public-private partnership. Although private benevolence
supported all of these schools, government contributions were generous:
The annual amount which the bureau devoted to school purposes rapidly
increased from $27,000 in 1865 to nearly one million in 1870. Between June 1,
1865, and September 1, 1871, the total reached $5,262,511.26. This sum
represented considerably more than half the total expense of schools under
bureau supervision; but benevolent associations always sustained a liberal share
of the financial burden, and the annual contribution of the freedmen gradually
67
increased." The bureau maintained a nominal supervision over negro schools
until its abolition in 1872. But its real efficient assistance ceased before July, 1870,
when the last congressional appropriation had been expended. At that time
there were under its direction 2,677 day and night schools with 3,300 teachers
and 149,581 pupils; 1,562 Sabbath schools with 6,007 teachers and 97,752 pupils,
or a grand total of 4,239 schools, 9,307 teachers, and 247,333 pupils. These were
irregularly distributed over the southern and border states. Reports from all
quarters showed a marked increase in attendance, an advance in scholarship, and
a record for punctuality and regularity which compared favorably with schools
of the north (Pierce, 1904, 82-3).
At the same time, the Reconstruction experience demonstrated the fundamental
weakness of private provision -- especially its tendency to fragmented and partial
addressing of problems:
the freedmen's bureau had fallen far short of a solution of the problem of negro
education. Of the four million eight hundred and eighty thousand free colored
people in the United States in 1870, nearly 1,700,000 were of school age. In 1869
only one-tenth of these were attending school. When deductions are made for
names duplicated in the reports, it is probable that no greater proportion
received instruction of any kind in 1870. More than half a million black children
were unprovided with the slightest educational facilities. Setting the number
annually taught at the highest possible figure, it did not greatly exceed the
annual increase in negro population. Of course the mass of adult negroes were
densely ignorant and many of the school children were making but the slightest
acquaintance with the three "r's." Even the adults knew little of the management
of schools and were unfit to judge of the qualifications of teachers. Not all states
had made provision for negro education, and in many states, such provision was
inadequate (Pierce, 1904, 82-3).
Despite the fact that General Howard was compelled to defend the Bureau's record
by depicting its activities -- and those of the private organizations it worked with -- in
the most favorable possible light, it seems quite clear that he understood that even the
generous resources of the public purse would not be sufficient to fully address the
challenge of reconstructing the South. Looking to the longer-term solution of using
68
educational institutions to create a black middle class of teachers, lawyers, physicians,
and other professionals, he began to shift the resources of the Bureau towards
establishing high schools, normal schools, and other institutions capable of producing
cadres of black leaders.
From Oliver Otis Howard, Autobiography of Oliver Otis Howard, Major General United
States Army (New York: The Baker & Taylor Company, 1904), II:390-401.
BEGINNING OF HOWARD UNIVERSITY
In my earlier interviews with Mr. Stanton in May, 1865, I claimed that the education of the
freedmen's children, and of adults, as far as practicable, was the true relief.
"Relief from what?" asked Stanton, glancing toward me over his colored glasses.
"Relief from beggary and dependence," I replied.
I had the same opinion with reference to our numerous "white refugees" of the South, though
it was believed that they would naturally be incorporated in ordinary schools there without
such prejudice to their interests as existed against the negro population.
Very soon all my assistants agreed with me that it would not be long before we must have
negro teachers, if we hoped to secure a permanent foothold for our schools. This conclusion
had become plain from the glimpses already given into Southern society. Naturally enough, the
most Christian of the Southern people would prefer to have white teachers from among
themselves. Feeling a sympathy for this seeming home prejudice, quite early in 1866, I tried the
experiment in one State, in cooperation with the Episcopal Bishop of that State, to put over our
school children Southern white teachers, male and female, but the bishop and I found that their
69
faith in negro education [391] was too small, and their ignorance of practical teaching too great,
to admit of any reasonable degree of success. After trial and failure it was given up. But faith
and enthusiasm combined to give the negro teachers a marvelous progress. Of course, in the
outset there were few negroes in the United States who were properly fitted to teach. The most
who had a smattering of learning could not speak the English language with a reasonable
correctness. It was then a plain necessity to have schools which could prepare teachers. My
own sentiment often found vent when I was visited by men of opposite convictions -- the one
set saying that no high schools or colleges were wanted for the freedmen, and the other declaring
their immediate and pressing necessity. My own thought favored the latter, but not with haste.
It was given in this form: "You cannot keep up the lower grades unless you have the higher."
Academies and colleges, universities and normal schools, had long been a necessity in all
sections where the free schools had been continuously sustained.
A brief experience showed us that the negro people were capable of education, with no limit
that men could set to their capacity. What white men could learn or had learned, they, or some
of them, could learn. There was one school diagonally across the street from my headquarters,
named the Wayland Seminary. The pupils were from fourteen to twenty years of age. It was
taught in 1866 by a lady, who, herself, was not only a fine scholar, but a thoroughly trained
teacher. One day the Hon. Kenneth Raynor, of North Carolina, whom I had long known and
valued as a personal friend, came to my room to labor with me and show me how unwise were
some of my ideas. [392] He said in substance about this educating the freedmen:
"General Howard, do you not know that you are educating the colored youth above their
business? You will only destroy them. Those young girls, for example; they will be too proud or
vain to work, and the consequence will be that they will go to dance houses and other places of
improper resort."
70
"My friend," I replied, "do you really think that? I am astonished! That is not the way
education affects the Yankee girls. Come with me to the Wayland school, across the street."
We went together to the large school building and entered the commodious room where the
school was just commencing its morning exercises. After extending a pleasant welcome, the
teacher gave us seats well back, where we could see the blackboards, which were near her desk,
and the open school organ at her left, ready for use. She first sent up two nice-looking girls, of
about fifteen years, to the instrument. One played, and the other, like a precentor, led the
school in singing. There was evident culture in the singing and playing, and none of the melody
was wanting. My friend's eyes moistened; but he whispered: "They always could sing!"
Next, we had a class of reading. It was grateful to cultured ears to have sentences well read
and words correctly pronounced. Spelling and defining followed, with very few mistakes. The
recitations at the blackboard in arithmetic that next came on were remarkable. To test the
pupils beyond their text, I went forward and placed some hard problems there. With readiness
and intelligence they were solved. The politeness and bearing of these young people to one
another, to the [393] teacher, and to us, struck my good friend with astonishment. Such a
school, even of whites, so orderly, so well trained, and so accomplished, Mr. Raynor had
seldom seen. As we returned across the street, arm in arm, he said to me: "General, you have
converted me!" This fine seminary was tantamount to a normal school. It was preparing many
excellent teachers for their subsequent work.
Miss M. R. Mann, a niece of the Hon. Horace Mann, through the aid of Massachusetts
friends, had a handsome school building constructed in Washington, D.C., and it had the best
possible appliances furnished -- all for her own use. She charged tuition, except for those
whose purpose was avowed to become teachers. She commenced at the foundation of
instruction, and led her pupils step by step, class by class, as high as she could conveniently
71
take them. She began the enterprise in December, 1865. Pupils of different ages were admitted,
so that teachers, still in embryo, might learn by experiment. It became before long the model
school of the District of Columbia. The neatness and order, the elegant rooms for reciting, and
the high grade of Miss Mann's classes in recitations always attracted and surprised visitors.
From this school, also, several teachers graduated and proved themselves able and worthy in
their subsequent successful career.
There were various other schools, as we know, in the United States which had been long in
existence, preparing colored teachers, physicians, ministers, lawyers, and others for the coming
needs of the new citizens -- notably Oberlin College; Wilberforce University, of Xenia, O.; Berea
Academy, Ky.; The Theological Institute (Baptist) at Washington, D. C., and [393] Ashmun
Institute at Oxford, Pa. The institute also for colored youth in Philadelphia, founded in 1837
by the bequest of a Friend, Richard Humphreys, was designed to teach agriculture and
mechanical arts, and prepare teachers for their profession. By other gifts, and by the help of
benevolent and friendly associations, this institute had come, in 1866, to have a capacity for
three hundred (300) pupils; it was fairly endowed and doing well, giving excellent results. Its
teachers were all colored persons. It had that year 48 graduates, 31 of whom became teachers.
Still, notwithstanding these sources of supply, the need for more teachers was constant, and if
any general system of free schools should be adopted, the demand would be a hundred times
beyond the possibility of meeting it by competent instructors.
As the work of carrying forward the schools developed, the old negro clergymen of every
name became inadequate for the religious instruction of the more enlightened people. Many
ministers felt themselves to be unlearned, and so sought such knowledge of books as they could
get. Negro pharmacists and other medical men were soon required, and contentions with white
men in the courts demanded friendly advocates at law.
72
Under the evident and growing necessity for higher education, in 1866 and 1867, a beginning
was made. Various good schools of a collegiate grade were started in the South, and normal
classes were about this time added, as at Hampton, Charleston, Atlanta, Macon, Savannah,
Memphis, Louisville, Mobile, Talladega, Nashville, New Orleans, and elsewhere.
In every way, as commissioner, I now encouraged the higher education, concerning which
there was so [395] much interest, endeavoring to adhere to my principle of Government aid in
dealing with the benevolent associations. These, by 1867, had broken away from a common
union, and were again pushing forward their denominational enterprises, but certainly, under
the Bureau's supervision, nowhere did they hurtfully interfere with one another.
Each denomination desired to have, here and there, a college of its own. Such institutions
the founders and patrons were eager to make different from the simple primary or grammar
schools; these, it was hoped and believed, would be eventually absorbed in each State in a great
free school system. The educators naturally wished to put a moral and Christian stamp upon
their students, especially upon those who would become instructors of colored youth. My own
strong wish was ever to lay permanent substructures and build thereon as rapidly as possible,
in order to give as many good teachers, professional men, and leaders to the rising generation of
freedmen as we could, during the few years of Governmental control.
One of the institutions for the higher education of the negro which has maintained ample
proportions and also bears my own name, warrants me in giving somewhat i*ia detail its origin
and my connection with it.
The latter part of 1866, a few gentlemen, at the instance of Rev. F. B. Morris, who held an
important Governmental office at the capital, and was a benevolent and scholarly man, came
together at the house of Mr. A. Brewster, on K Street, Washington.
73
There had been two or three of such informal meetings, consisting mainly of residents of
Washington, when Senators Wilson and Pomeroy, B. C. Cook, Member of the House, and
myself were invited to this [396] respectable self-constituted council, November 20, 1866.
Nearly all of the dozen or more gentlemen who were present, and among them Rev. Dr. C. B.
Boynton, the pastor of the Congregational Church of the city, were Congregationalists. A
preliminary organization was already in existence. The subject under discussion for this time
was a place for a theological school for the colored preachers and those who were to become
such that their teachings should be of value. Mr. H. D. Nichols moved that the new institution
be entitled "Howard Theological Seminary." That name was adopted. Mr. Morris and some
others were in the outset in favor of connecting with the seminary some industrial features; and,
to show my good will, I made the same offer, being authorized by the law, that I had been
making to other educational associations, that if they would furnish a proper lot, I would cause
to be erected thereon, by the Bureau, a suitable building. I believed it wiser not to use my name,
but it was remarked sportively "there are other Howards."
At a meeting December 4, 1866, there was in ideas and proposals considerable progress
manifested. At first, I had desired delay, thinking that the time was hardly ripe for a large
institution at the capital; but, seeing the enthusiasm and fixed purpose of this body of some
fourteen gentlemen, a few of whom I now observed were Presbyterians and two or three of other
persuasions, I participated in their discussions. "Howard Normal and Theological Institute for
the Education of Teachers and Preachers," was the new title adopted.
On January 8, 1867, at another gathering, Dr. Boynton was elected the president of the
preliminary board. At this session my brother, General C.H. [397] Howard, then assistant
commissioner of the district and vicinity, moved a committee to plan a law department -- a
medical department having already been favorably canvassed. Thus, little by little, the idea of
a university grew upon the preliminary board, the project of an institution which should have
74
many separate departments acting together under one board of trustees. At this January sitting,
an important committee was named to obtain a charter. It consisted of Senators Wilson and
Pomeroy and Hon. B. C. Cook; and in anticipation of funds, General George W. Balloch was
elected treasurer of the university. The institution had already stepped up into the dignity of
another name, to wit: "Howard University." I had, during the discussion, continued to oppose
that name, not only from modesty, but from my feeling that I could do more privately and
officially for an enterprise that did not bear my own name; I did not wish to be suspected and
accused of raising a monument to myself. But the universal voice was against me; in fact, the
naming did little harm, for it was not long before the name, even in a public address to the
students, was imputed by a distinguished English divine to John Howard, the philanthropist.
The charter was easily obtained, having seventeen charter members. The incorporation title
was: "An Act to incorporate the Howard University in the District of Columbia." It was
approved by the President of the United States March 2, 1867.
The enactment required a board of trustees of not less than thirteen members to be chosen by
the incorporators.
The scope of the university, in keeping with my own plan for that institution, is indicated in
the charter: to consist of six designated departments and such [397] others as the trustees may
establish -- first, normal; second, collegiate; third, theological; fourth, law; fifth, medicine; sixth,
agriculture. Under this charter, Howard University was set in motion.
General Whittlesey and I were very soon appointed a committee to look up a site. We had
visited various parts of the District of Columbia without being able to get an option for our
purpose, when, one day, we were standing near the place where the largest structure of Howard
University now is. Whittlesey had been there before and liked the site. It was now evident to us
both that we could not find a more appropriate place. The outlook, taking in the city of
75
Washington, the monument, the Capitol, the White House, and other public buildings, and a
grand expanse besides, including miles of the Potomac, could not be better. To locate good
structures there would make weight for the manhood of those whom we especially purposed to
benefit by a university education.
Together we went to the house of the owner of the estate, Mr. John A. Smith; it was situated
just beyond the present location of the President's house. The cottage was almost hidden by a
small grove of trees. We found Mr. Smith, with his wife and two or three members of his family.
As we sat together, I tried to get Mr. Smith to promise a third of his farm. He claimed to have
150 acres. Some time before this the Bureau had purchased a small lot nearer the city of this
Mr. Smith, with an old dance house on it, to use it for educational purposes, and had rented the
same to the trustees for the first university school. It would unify the proposed departments if
we could now make a favorable bargain with Mr. Smith. But he insisted on selling the whole at
one thousand dollars ($1,000) per [398] acre, or none at all. General Whittlesey was of the
opinion that in a few years*@ time enough of such a property could be sold to pay Mr. Smith's
price, and still leave us a reasonable portion as a reserve for our use. I, too, felt sure of it.
Suddenly, I said: "Mr. Smith, what terms will you give us on the whole tract?"
He answered: "One third down and the balance in one and two years."
"All right," I answered, "we will take the land provided you give us a clear title."
His wife turned pale at the suddenness of the bargain, and there was evident excitement in
all the company present. After we had left the house, General Whittlesey, who was a good
business man, remarked with a smile: "Well, general, if the trustees do not sustain us in this
purchase, we can handle it without them."
76
We were sustained by our board, though the question of money troubled them. Time was
gained by finding that there were several encumbrances which required negotiation and
settlement. At last, Mr. Smith deducted on this account two thousand dollars ($2,000) and the
settled price became one hundred and forty seven thousand five hundred dollars ($147,500).
General Whittlesey and Mr. R. M. Hall were constituted our land agents with power to
advertise and convey. The trustees authorized them to make surveys and maps, and instructed
them to sell all the lots over and above the University Reservation.
Later, in his report to our board, which unkind criticism had drawn out, Whittlesey made
several interesting statements; for instance he wrote: "When appointed the agent of the board
the task was set [400] Howard before me of solving the financial problem of making one half or
two thirds of the land purchased pay for the whole. This I have done. My success has been a
happy surprise to myself. My work is open to fair criticism, but I am not willing to be subjected
to unjust censure." He just then demurred at the yoke of extraordinary surveillance that was
sought to be imposed upon him, and he asked them to find another agent in whom they could
repose ordinary confidence exercised among business men.
In the same paper, Whittlesey said: "The truth is the board of trustees have had very little to
do with the purchase of this property. They did not encourage it. Several members expressed
opposition to the whole project.
"The work was done by General Howard and by me, acting under his authority. The entire
responsibility was thrown upon us. Had it been a failure, we should have borne the disgrace,
and the board would have declared itself free from all blame. It has not failed, and every
person in the land, who has at heart the welfare of the university and the good of those for
whom it is designed, must rejoice."
77
How to meet the primary payment was my first problem. Some gifts had come to our
university treasury, but they were not enough. The university treasurer showed that the first
amount to be paid to Mr. Smith was twenty thousand dollars ($20,000). To meet that and
other expenses in starting this enterprise, there was in the hands of the Bureau disbursing officer
a residue of "the refugees and freedmen's fund." And as I had the authority of law in the
Appropriation Act for March 2, 1867, to use it at my discretion for education, after reflection, I
resolved to [401] transfer thirty thousand dollars ($30,000) to the Howard University treasury,
and did so by a carefully drawn order dated April 15, 1867. The university treasurer, being
duly authorized by the trustees, receipted for the same. Thus the treasurer now had ample
means to meet the first payment.
July 2d of this same year the executive committee of Howard University wrote to the board:
"The number of lots sold is 245, and their average value, as estimated by Mr. R. M. Hall, their
agent, is six hundred dollars ($600) each, and the total value one hundred and forty-seven
thousand dollars ($147,000)," so that the university treasury was fairly well supplied, as the
deferred payments from lots, from time to time, came in.
Able instructors, meanwhile, were selected. A normal department and a preparatory to fit
young men and women for teachers and for college courses were well under way before the end
of the year. More than 100 pupils were enrolled, and a small college class formed. Theological
lectures and careful teaching were given to an assembly of colored ministers of various
denominations, who had been but partially prepared for their work in their churches. The task
of planning suitable structures, and of erecting them, went steadily on. Applications were
numerous for the admission of students from all parts of the country.
Thus I have indicated the beginnings of that large institution, which has already given to
intelligent youth at the nation's capital, whatever might have been their previous condition, the
benefits of a complete collegiate course and of a thorough professional training.
78
The Freedmen's Bureau finally closed out its operations in 1872. By 1876, as a part of
the compromise which decided the presidential contest between Democrat Samuel
Tilden and Republican Rutherford B. Hayes, the federal military presence with
withdrawn from the South and Reconstruction was declared completed. Though the
northern freedmen's societies continued their work, now unprotected from white
terrorism, they became increasingly discouraged. Even those whom they had hoped to
help -- the freed slaves -- seemed to show diminishing interest in being educated. The
following documents, one an article which appeared in the 1875 annual report of the
Freedmen's Aid Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church, the other of which was
written by J.L.M. Curry, a southerner long active in negro education, reveal both the
demoralization of northern volunteers by the mid-1870s and the emergence of
philanthropic attitudes which are curiously tainted by racism and paternalism.
DESIRE FOR EDUCATION FAST WANING
Report of Freedmen's Aid Society, M. E. Church, 1875, p. 59.
79
WHILE . . . the children of freedmen are still zealous in acquiring knowledge, this desire,
which was once full-orbed, is fast waning with the masses of those who have passed their
childhood. There was a time during the war and shortly after, when groups of colored men in
middle life, and even in life's decline, could have been seen gathered about field stumps on
which pine knots were blazing, trying thus to acquire the rudiments of an education. The
enthusiasm was then at fever-heat. But this sight is at present rarely, if ever, witnessed. Said
one of the speakers at the last anniversary of Fiske University, Nashville: "At the close of the
war the people rushed into the schools -- old gray-headed men and almost helpless children.
There was an impulse that carried everything before it. Our own institution numbered at one
time (1866) twelve hundred students. Then it dropped down to less than three hundred."
There are ample data upon which to establish on general grounds these deductions. We need,
perhaps, refer to but a single instance, inasmuch as it is one that furnishes an illustration which
is almost an exact parallel to the case before us. When the blacks of the British West Indies
were emancipated they manifested a zeal for education only second to that shown by the
freedmen of America; but to-day, especially in Jamaica, the liberated slaves," says Colonel
Baylor, "have relaxed into degrading sloth, if not also into barbarism." No one who has
investigated this case questions but it might have been other-wise. The fatal mistakes were in
diminishing their wages to such a pittance as required all their energies to eke out a mere
subsistence; also, the withdrawal of all government aid by way of educational provisions;
likewise the absence of personal encouragement to people so much needing it, and without
which the emancipated will seldom, if ever, do otherwise than lapse gradually from their first
ambitions and aims into idleness and indifference.
J.E.L. Curry, THE MISTAKES OF THE RECONSTRUCTION EDUCATION
[Race Problems of the South. Proceedings of the
First Annual Conference at Montgomery. (1900), p. 108]
80
I HAVE very little respect for the intelligence or the patriotism of the man who doubts the
capacity of the Negro for improvement or usefulness. The progress made by the Negroes in
education, considering their environments, their heredity, the abominable scoundrels who have
come here from other quarters to seduce and lead them astray, is marvelous. . . It is not just to
condemn the Negro for the education which he received in the early years after the war. That
was the period of reconstruction, the saturnalia of misgovernment, the greatest possible
hindrance to the progress of the freedmen, an immitigable curse, the malignant attempt to use
the Negro voter as a pawn in the corrupt game of manufacturing members of Congress. The
education was unsettling, demoralizing, pandered to a wild frenzy for schooling as a quick
method of reversing social and political conditions. Nothing could have been better devised for
deluding the poor Negro, and making him the tool, the slave of corrupt taskmasters. Education
is a natural consequence of citizenship and enfranchisement, I should say of freedom and
humanity. But with deliberate purpose to subject the Southern States to Negro domination, and
secure the States permanently for partisan ends, the education adopted was contrary to
common-sense, to human experience, to all noble purposes. The curriculum was for a people in
highest degree of civilization; the aptitude and capabilities and needs of the Negro were wholly
disregarded. Especial stress was laid on classics and liberal culture -- to bring the race per
saltum to the same plane with their former masters, and realize the theory of social And
political equality. A race more highly civilized with best heredities and environments, could not
have been coddled with more disregard of all the teachings of human history and the necessities
of the race. Colleges and universities, established and conducted by the Freedmen's Bureau and
Northern churches and societies, sprang up like mushrooms, and the teachers, ignorant,
fanatical, without self-poise, proceeded to make all possible mischief. It is irrational, cruel to
hold the Negro, under such strange conditions, responsible for all the ill consequences of bad
education, unwise teachers, reconstruction villainies and partisan schemes. To educate at all,
slowly, was a gigantic task.
81
Though the southern states had been compelled to extend suffrage to all males,
regardless of race, and had been persuaded (largely through the work of the Peabody
Fund) to establish public school systems, these advances were rapidly reversed without
federal oversight. Uncontrolled terrorism by the Klan and other groups drove blacks
from the schools and from the polls. Thousands were lynched and brutalized. Black
elected officials were murdered. Many black farmers lost their land and were reduced
to peonage and share-cropping. Northern reformers, preoccupied with other
problems, largely shut their eyes to what was going on and left the South to solve its
own problems. And even those northerners who maintained philanthropic
commitments to southern blacks did so in a frame of mind which assumed their
inferiority. In the decades after 1870, the thinking of educated Americans was
profoundly influenced by the ideas of biologist Charles Darwin, whose evolutionary
ideas were used as the basis for justifying the stratification of society both by class and
by race ("the struggle for existence" and the "survival of the fittest"). Eventually such
doctrines would be used to justify imperialist adventures as well ("the white man's
burden").
Although the kinds of institutions of higher learned favored by General Howard
continued their work, a new form of education which trained blacks for agricultural and
industrial occupations attracted support from southerners and northerners alike.
Pioneered by another Union General, Samuel Chapman Armstrong, "industrial
education," was geared both to teaching blacks needed skills while also teaching them
their subservient position. "The thing to be done was clear," Armstrong would write in
1868, "to train selected Negro youths who should go out and teach and lead their
people, first by example, by getting land and homes; to give them not a dollar that they
could earn for themselves; to teach respect for labor, to replace stupid drudgery with
82
skilled hands, and to those ends to build up an industrial system for the sake not only of
self support and intelligent labor, but also for the sake of character" (quoted in Fleming,
1907, II: 209). In 1868, Armstrong, an agent of the Freedmen's Bureau, established the
Hampton Institute, with assistance from the American Missionary Association.
Hampton's curriculum, which educated "blacks to achieve within the narrowly defined
limits of their social and economic sphere," helped to persuade southerners of the value
of educating the freedmen (Webb, 1989, 450).
One of Hampton's best-known graduates was Booker T. Washington, who went on
to establish the Tuskeegee Institute, with both public and private support. "Unlike
Hampton and other new black schools," writes historian Robert Norrell, "Tuskeegee
was staffed entirely by blacks. In the following, Washington summarized the
"accommodationist" thinking of his mentor, General Armstrong.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON ON ARMSTRONG'S PLANS FOR NEGRO EDUCATION.
I think I might state his objects briefly as follows: First. He was anxious to give the colored
people an idea of the dignity, and the beauty and civilizing power of intelligent labor with the
hand. He was conscious of the fact that he was dealing with a race that had little necessity to
labor in its native land before coming to America, and after coming to this country were forced
to labor for two hundred and fifty years under circumstances that were not calculated to make
the race fond of hard work.
Second. It was his object to teach the Negro to lift labor out of drudgery and toil by putting
thought and skill into it.
83
Third. He saw that through the medium of industrial education he could bring the two races
in the South into closer relations with each other. He knew that in other matters there were
differences which it would take years to change, but he knew that industrially the interests of
the two races were identical in the South, and that as soon as he could prove to a southern
white man that an educated skilled Negro workman was of more value to the community than
an ignorant, shiftless one, the southern white man would take an interest in the education of the
black boy.
Fourth. Through the industrial system at the Hampton Institute it was his object to give the
students an opportunity to work out a portion of their boarding expenses. In this way he meant
to prevent the school becoming a hothouse for producing students with no power of self-help or
independence. I have often heard him say that the mere effort which the student put forth
through the industries at Hampton to help himself was of the greatest value to the student,
whether the labor itself was of very much value or not. In a word, he meant to use the
industries as a means for building character -- to teach that all forms of labor were honorable
and all forms of idleness a disgrace.
The idea of industrial education, beginning for our people at Hampton, has gradually spread
among them until I am safe in saying that it has permeated the whole race in every section of the
country. There is not a State in the Union where there is any considerable proportion of our
race whose influence counts for anything in which they are not interested in industrial education
and are manifesting this interest by the establishment of a school or by other substantial helps.
They now realize, as never before, that the education of the head, the heart and the hand must
go together. That while we need classical and professional men, we need a still larger number
trained along industrial lines.
84
Not only has General Armstrong's belief in industrial education spread among our people in
the South, but its influence is felt in the West Indies and Africa and other foreign countries, to
such an extent that there are many calls coming from these countries for industrial education.
The work at the Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute is simply one of the results of the
work of the Hampton Institute. There are a number of industrial schools, either small or large, in
every State where there are any considerable number of our people.
Perhaps the most interesting thing in connection with the influence of General Armstrong is
the rapid growth and spread of industrial education among the southern white people. For a
number of years after the Hampton Institute was started the southern white people gave no
attention to the subject, and rather took for granted, I think, that it was something in which the
Negroes only should receive training. But as they realized from year to year the rapid growth of
industrial education among the colored people and the skill and intelligence which they were
acquiring, southern white educators here and there began to make investigation and to inquire
whether or not the same kind of education was not needed for the southern white boy and girl,
and very carefully and modestly at first industries were introduced into a white school here and
there. These schools, however, were not very popular among the white people at first, but the
idea of industrial education among the southern white people has spread until at the present
moment I think every southern State has one or more institutions established for this kind of
training for white youths, and the industrial idea has become almost as popular among the
white people as among the colored people.
I think I am not going too far when I make one other suggestion, and that is that the whole
country owes General Armstrong a debt not only for the rapid and permanent growth of
industrial education among the colored people and white people of the South, but it is to him
that all are indebted more than to any one man for the growth of the hand training in the
85
northern and western States. It is seldom . . . that one individual has had the opportunity
through a single idea to revolutionize the educational thought and activity of so large a
proportion of the world as has been true of the founder of Hampton.
The Reconstruction experience profoundly shaped the future of American
philanthropy in a number of ways. First, because it sought to engage a problem of
enormous scale and scope, it forced the more thoughtful philanthropists to think
strategically. Despite their initial optimism, it quickly became apparent to most of those
trying to deal with the freedmen that there were far more people in need of aid than
could possibly be helped --even with the combined resources of government and
private benevolence. Thus, if they hoped to do any good at all, they would have to
target resources and energies carefully. Doing this required thinking about social and
economic causation in ways that had not previously been done -- thinking about "root
causes" rather than simple relief or almsgiving. While the Sanitary Commission had
certainly provided a precedent for this kind of thinking, the challenges which it had
faced -- with the exception of its efforts with regard to the future of disabled veterans -had been relatively short-term in character and did not involve an attempt to
fundamentally restructure social, economic, and political relationships. This new
orientation to "root causes" and to strategic solutions would be a keynote of the truly
modern forms of philanthropy that would begin to emerge by the 1880s.
Secondly, the Reconstruction experience emphasized the divergence -- already
evident by the end of the Civil War -- of religious and secular philanthropy. While the
charitable, educational, health-care, and other eleemosynary activities churches and
religious institutions would continue to be a crucially important part of American
philanthropy, more scientific (in style, at least), efficiency-oriented secular agencies -most of them connected to the rising universities and professions -- would come to
86
dominate the philanthropic mainstream. There was a certain irony in this, since many
of the key figures in the creation of secular philanthropy like Barnabas Sears, General
Agent and chief architect of the policies of the Peabody Education Fund, and Frederick
W. Gates, John D. Rockefeller's chief philanthropic advisor, were clergymen. But,
whatever their private religious convictions, their institutional commitments led in
distinctly secular directions.
Thirdly, the Reconstruction experience led to an important redefinition of the
relation between philanthropy and government. The public-private partnership
represented by the Freedmen's Bureau, despite the amazing amount of work that it
did, proved ultimately to be a bitter disappointment to most reformers. Despite the
unquestionably integrity and unswerving commitment of officers like General Howard
and his associates in the Bureau, evidently widespread corruption and malfeasance at
the local levels of the Bureau's operations combined the with uncertainties of
Congressional support, made it clear that government could simply not be depended
on. While there would be many other forms of public-private partnerships in the
decades following Reconstruction -- primarily involving government contracting with
private agencies, the Reconstruction experience seems to have convinced many
philanthropists that solutions to society's problems were more likely to emerge from
the private rather than the public sector.
Fourthly, the Reconstruction experience led to the discovery of new forms of
philanthropic activity -- the most important of these being the grantmaking foundation.
The Peabody Education Fund inspired other similar efforts. Some, like the John F.
Slater Fund, founded in 1882, were directed to southern problems. Others, like that
which Samuel Tilden attempted to establish under his contested 1887 will, sought to
empower trustees to act at their discretion for the more general benefit of mankind.
87
Though foundations of the latter type would not gain firm legal footing until the
twentieth century, the success of the Peabody Fund -- and the unquestionable
prominence of its trustees, which included the likes of J.P. Morgan and Theodore
Roosevelt -- would certainly play an important role in blazing the trail for those that
would follow.
Finally, the Reconstruction experience established a paradigm -- and at the same time
set forth the problematic nature of -- international aid and development efforts by
Americans. Though the Freedmen's Bureau certainly drew on the experience of earlier
domestic and foreign missionary efforts (the Hampton Institute's General Armstrong
was the son of New England missionaries to Hawaii), none of them had attempted the
reorganization of a region's political, economic, and social institutions -- the kind of
comprehensive development effort that would characterize American foreign
adventures through much of the twentieth century. To the extent that it pursued such a
broad agenda, Reconstruction really created the template for an entirely new kind of
initiative. In doing so, however, it raised many of the dilemmas that would bedevil
such efforts, especially the tensions between paternalism and empowerment.
Sources:
The American Freedman, A Monthly Journal Devoted to the Promotion of Freedom, Industry,
Education, and Christian Morality in the South (New York, NY: The American Freedman's Union
Commission, 1866-68).
88
Sarah Knowles Bolton, Famous Givers and Their Gifts (New York, NY: Thomas Y. Crowell &
Company, 1896).
J.L.M. Curry, A Brief Sketch of George Peabody and a History of the Peabody Education Fund through
Thirty Years (Cambridge, MA: University Press: John Wilson and Son, 1898).
J.L.M. Curry, "The Mistakes of Reconstruction Education," in Race Problems of the South.
Proceedings of the First Annual Conference at Montgomery. (1900), 108.
Walter L. Fleming, ed., Documentary History of Reconstruction: Political, Military, Social, Religious,
Educational & Industrial 1865 to the Present Time (Cleveland, OH: The Arthur H. Clark
Company, 1906).
Sarah Forbes Hughes, Letters and Recollections of John Murray Forbes (Boston: Houghton Mifflin
and Company, 1899).
Oliver Otis Howard, Autobiography of Oliver Otis Howard, Major General United States Army
(New York: The Baker & Taylor Company, 1907).
Robert J. Norrell, "Tuskegee Institute," in Charles Reagan Wilson and William Ferris, eds.,
Encyclopedia of Southern Culture (New York: Anchor Books, 1989), 518-19.
George Peabody, Three Letters of Mr. George Peabody Who Established the Peabody Education Fund
A.D. 1867 (Cambridge, MA: University Press: John Wilson and Son, 1910).
Paul Skeels Peirce, The Freedmen's Bureau: A Chapter in the History of Reconstruction (Iowa City,
IA: Published by the University, 1904).
Edward L. Pierce, "The Contrabands at Fortress Monroe," in The Atlantic 8:XLIX, 626-40.
Edward L. Pierce, "The Negroes at Port Royal, S.C. -- Report of the Government Agent," in
Frank Moore, ed., The Rebellion Record (New York: 1864), Supplement I, 303-20.
Proceedings of the Trustees of the Peabody Education Fund from Their Original Organization on the
8th of February, 1867. Boston, MA: Press of John Wilson and Son, 1875).
Joe M. Richardson, Christian Reconstruction: The American Missionary Society and Southern Blacks,
1861-1890 (Athens, GA: The University of Georgia Press, 1986).
Willie Lee Rose, Rehearsal for Reconstruction: The Port Royal Experiment (New York: Oxford
University Press, 1964).
Henry Lee Swint, The Northern Teacher in the South, 1862-1870 (New York: Octagon Books,
1967).
Additional Readings:
Herbert Apthecker, ed., A Documentary History of the Negro People in the United States (New
York, NY: Citadel Press, 1990).
89
W.R. Brock, An American Crisis: Congress and Reconstruction, 1865-1867 (New York, NY: Harper
& Row, 1963).
Ronald E. Butchart, Northern Schools, Southern Blacks, and Reconstruction, 1862-1875 (Westport,
CT: Greenwood Press, 1980).
Merle Curti and Roderick Nash, Philanthropy and the Shaping of American Higher Education (New
Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1965).
W.E.B. DuBois, Black Reconstruction (1935).
Russell Duncan, ed., Blue-Eyed Child of Fortune: The Civil War Letters of Colonel Robert Gould Shaw
(Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 1992).
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